Twenty private high schools whose baseball teams played in high-profile national tournaments in the last five years have systematically recruited students by offering tuition payments or other special treatment, it was learned Tuesday.
Inquiries by Kyodo News found that perennial baseball powerhouses PL Gakuen of Osaka, Tohoku of Miyagi Prefecture and Saibi of Ehime Prefecture are among the 20, out of the 93 schools surveyed. Shirakaba Gakuen of Hokkaido, Tokyo's Kokushikan and Kanzei of Okayama Prefecture also admitted to using the system of paying admission fees and/or tuition for baseball team players.
Tohoku's system covers 20 freshmen per year, while Saibi pays 20,000 yen a month in scholarship to 46 of its baseball players, according to the survey results. PL Gakuen terminated special treatment based on advice from the Japan High School Baseball Federation in 2005. In a related development Tuesday, the Japan Student Baseball Association approved a plan by the high school baseball federation to take action against schools paying tuition for their players in violation of association rules.