Tag - education

 
 

EDUCATION

The Japanese government updated its English education guidelines in 2017 to emphasize communication over grammar and memorization. Public school teachers are incredibly busy, however, which means schools haven’t been able to implement changes uniformly. Private and alternative schools are attempting to remedy this.
LIFE / Language / Longform
May 27, 2024
The language of opportunity: Bilingual education is on the rise in Japan
Stuck with a reputation for poor English, Japan is pushing its next generation to be bilingual. Privately run schools are seeing the benefits.
The increase in foreign student numbers in Japan came after the government started to gradually lift its COVID-19 travel restrictions in 2022.
JAPAN / Society
May 24, 2024
Foreign student numbers in Japan grew in 2023
A survey found 279,274 foreign students in the country as of May 2023, up 20.8% from a year earlier but still below prepandemic levels.
Under the leadership of President Xi Jinping, the Chinese government is stepping up its antiespionage crackdown.
JAPAN
May 16, 2024
Ex-Japanese university professor gets six years in prison in China
Yuan Keqin, a former professor at a university in Hokkaido, went missing in May 2019 while temporarily returning to his homeland.
The Waseda University campus in Tokyo. An 18-year-old male test-taker is suspected of using smart glasses to cheat during the university's entrance exam.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
May 16, 2024
Man suspected of using smart glasses to cheat on Waseda University exams
Photos of the tests were posted on the social media platform X to solicit answers.
A pro-Palestinian supporter in Tokyo takes part in a protest against Israeli attacks on Gaza. Japanese universities are also experiencing their share of pro-Palestinian student demonstrations similar to those elsewhere in the world.
COMMENTARY / Japan
May 15, 2024
What the campus Gaza protests lack — in Japan, too
Students are right to be distressed over the suffering of Palestinians. But are they applying cognitive empathy to understand the other side, too?
Smoke billows following Israeli strikes on the Islamic University of Gaza (IUG) on October 11, 2023.
WORLD / Society
May 13, 2024
Gazans strive to study as war shatters education system
The U.N. estimates that 72.5% of schools in Gaza will need full reconstruction or major rehabilitation.
An education ministry survey has shown that the English proficiency of public junior and senior high school students in Japan is continuing to improve.
JAPAN
May 9, 2024
Japanese students' English proficiency is improving
The levels of English skills greatly varied depending on the region, according to the education ministry.
A Cambridge research fellow's dismissal is sparking outcry amid a freedom of speech debate about the university's diversity, equality and inclusion policies.
COMMENTARY
May 7, 2024
Will Cambridge support free speech?
Cambridge research fellow's dismissal sparks outcry amid a freedom of speech debate at the university and its diversity, equality and inclusion policies.
The 1960s protests, rooted in civil rights and anti-war movements, convulsed campuses nationwide for nearly a decade, while recent protests lack comparable breadth and intensity.
COMMENTARY / World
May 6, 2024
Comparing Gaza protests to the ’60s is wrong — and dangerous
Confusing a few weeks of pro-Palestinian activism with a more than decade-long movement could lead to needless tragedy.
Students can learn faster by using tablets in the classroom. In Malawi, every dollar spent on this type of learning delivers over $100 worth of higher productivity in the long term.
COMMENTARY / World
May 3, 2024
The policies that deliver the most bang for a government's buck
Instead of making many grand promises, governments should prioritize smart policies that yield the highest returns, such as tablets in schools.
Children hold cork sheets to cover them from the sun while walking along a street during a countrywide heat wave in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on Sunday.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
May 1, 2024
Extreme heat is closing schools, widening learning gaps worldwide
Many countries experiencing heat waves are torn between closing schools or leaving them open, both of which negatively affect children's learning.
Filipino parents and children. In public schools in Metro Manila, a survey of more than 8,000 teachers last month showed 87% of students had suffered from heat-related conditions.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Apr 25, 2024
First COVID, now heat: Online schooling returns to the Philippines
Pupils at 7,000 public schools in the country were sent home last week due to unusually hot weather.
Over 75% of financially struggling parents with children newly entering school said they have difficulty preparing money buy uniforms, according to a survey.
JAPAN / Society
Apr 15, 2024
Struggling parents cut living costs for kids' new school life
Over 75% of parents said uniforms were the most challenging expense
A special subgroup of the Central Council for Education, which advises the education minister, is examining boosting teachers' adjustment allowances, currently set at 4% of monthly salary, as part of measures to improve conditions at public schools.
JAPAN / Society
Apr 13, 2024
Japan considering first hike in teachers' overtime pay in 50 years
There has been a proposal for raising the allowances to 10% of monthly salary or even higher, sources have said.
Afghan children in the earthquake-hit district of Zinda Jan, in Herat, Afghanistan, in October 2023.
WORLD / Society
Apr 10, 2024
Afghan kids study without school buildings six months after major quake
The October earthquake killed more than 1,500 people and damaged or destroyed more than 63,000 homes, according to an assessment.
Pedestrians in the Mahalaxmi area of Mumbai on 2021. Mumbai is among the most densely populated cities in the world.
WORLD / Society
Mar 29, 2024
Young Indians more likely to be jobless if they’re educated
The percentage young unemployed Indians dropped to 82.9% in 2022 from 88.6% in 2000, while the share of educated youths climbed to 65.7% from 54.2%.
The mortality rate of junior high school graduates is around 1.4 times higher than that of those who graduated from universities, according to a survey by the National Cancer Center Japan, indicating that risk factors differ depending on education level.
JAPAN / Society
Mar 28, 2024
Estimated mortality rates by education level released in Japan
A gap between junior high school graduates and those who went through higher education has been found.
The Tokyo District Court on Tuesday sentenced a former teacher at a Tokyo cram school to two years in prison, suspended for five years, for secretly filming the girls attending the school.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Mar 27, 2024
Ex-teacher at Tokyo cram school found guilty of secret filming
The teacher also sent some of the images to another former teacher from the same cram school, and posted the pictures on an online chat forum.
Some 43% of Gen Z and 41% of millennials say they suffer from a flawed perception of their finances.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 24, 2024
'Money dysmorphia' traps the younger generations
Some 43% of Gen Z and 41% of millennials say they suffer from a flawed perception of their finances.
Afghan schoolgirls in 2022. Boys and men will return to classes when the Afghan new year starts in late March, but girls and women will be left behind again by a Taliban government education blockade that is part of a raft of restrictions the United Nations has labelled "gender apartheid."
WORLD / Society
Mar 21, 2024
Afghan girls and women cling to glitchy, lonesome online learning
Schools in Afghanistan have opened for the new academic year, but girls have been banned from joining classes for the third year in a row.

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?