One Step Forward on a Treadmill

The education of a nation’s youth is of the utmost importance in today’s society, and certainly this is no exception in Japan. The country’s education standards are some of the highest in the world, and its students are among some of the hardest working. In any developed nation, education is the key to an individual’s economic success, where those with the higher education reflect a higher degree of economic success. This desire for economic success is the primary motivation for individuals in any developed country to achieve an education. Japan, however, has taken this motivation to the extreme. Whereas most elementary, middle, and high school students in the United States will spend an average of seven hours a day in school, many students in Japan have chosen to attend private tutoring classes that continue for many more hours above their mandated school hours. These private tutoring classes, called juku and yobiko, while not required by law for students to attend, still attract a majority of junior high students. In 1993, Sixty-seven percent of all ninth graders attended some form of tutoring outside of regular school hours. Counting regular school hours and juku combined, a student that attends juku in addition will spend close nearly ten hours a day in the classroom. This represents nearly six percent of their total wake hours. When one factors in commuting, eating, studying, and sleep, this limits the free time of the students to nearly nothing. The only free time that exists for students that attend juku lies on the weekends. In comparison to the United States, the average American middle school student receives an average of four to five hours of free time per day during the week. This poses the question, why do Japanese students give up their free time to work and study tirelessly in their schools and attend juku outside of class? What causes juku to be so popular when students could be spending their free time doing other things, similar to students in western nations?

In determining the answers to these questions, a list of texts has been useful in gathering information to create an answer. Examining Adolescent Leisure Time Across Cultures, by Suman Verma, has been helpful source in acquiring statistics about leisure time in Japan, as well as statistics on student opinions on studying and enjoyment. The Japanese High School, by Shoko Yoneyama, has also proven valuable as a source for history and development of the current Japanese educational system. For a primary source, an editorial by Casey Shoenberger titled, “The Japanese School System: Counting Out Predictable Cogs,” has given a first hand account at the pressures of the Japanese school system on its youth.

The demand for juku among junior high students is indirectly related to the hiring traditions of major companies. Currently in Japan most of the hiring for companies is done through rankings of universities. In fact, most companies prefer to hire directly out of college because they see those with prior experience as being “tainted.” It is more desirable for a company to hire a fresh college graduate so that he can be molded into the employee that they want. Anyone unlucky enough to lose his job during the middle of his career is basically condemned to part time jobs the rest of his life. However, Japanese workers in the post-war industrialization negotiated for lifetime employment, a concept known as shuushin-koyou. With this guarantee, although workers cannot necessarily switch occupations so readily, there is little or no chance of them ever losing their current employment.

These hiring traditions began in the post-war era as the government of Japan pushed for high-speed economic growth. School knowledge became the discriminating tool between the less able and the more able students. Soon after this practice of education competition was implemented schools began to change their curriculum. This is evident as the number of students who could not keep up with their studies increased substantially. The necessity to sort students uniformly created the demand for standardized exams.

In addition to the guarantee of lifetime employment, the government and major companies in Japan have created a ranking system for universities. Tokyo University is blatantly the top choice of the government and nearly every major company. In the government bureaucracy alone, Tokyo University graduates comprise two-thirds to ninety percent of those positions. Furthermore, one-third of all company presidents in Japan have graduated from Tokyo University. The high probability of garnering a top job through Tokyo University has made it the most selective university in Japan. Consequently, the entrance exam for Tokyo University is also one of the most challenging of all entrance exams. Over the years this relationship between academic hierarchy and employment hierarchy has become more evident. Companies will hire by the competitiveness of the entrance exam of the university.

The popularity for juku is fueled by the competitive nature of the college entrance exams. Performing well on these exams is aided by entrance into competitive high schools, which, like colleges, have their own entrance exams. As shown before, the college one chooses can determine one’s future employment opportunities, making getting into the right college essential to an economically secure future. Furthermore, since high school prepares one for entrance into these universities, that also makes entrance into the elite high school just as important. Juku supply this demand to enter the elite high schools through rigorous tutoring for the examinations. In fact, the entire juku curriculum has simply entrance examinations in mind.5 The result creates students who will accept all information without question. The tutors are training the students to answer questions well for the exam. Even if something might not be right, it is in the students’ best interest to accept it without question because that will help them do well on the exam. With this design of not questioning authority, the system of “exam hell,” where entrance exams determine one’s future, has been kept in place, keeping the demand for juku high as well.

The direct motivation for students to enroll in juku lies almost entirely among outside forces, such as family and competition with other students. Forty-one percent of junior high students report that they would rather be doing something else rather than attending juku. Despite such lack of enjoyment, many Japanese students still enroll themselves in juku. The reason lies in the commonly held belief that everyone has the same mental ability. Confucian ideals emphasize attaining higher educational achievement as the primary method to achieve social status and self-fulfillment.6 Furthermore, the ideals of bunbo-ryodo contribute to the popular notion in Japan that “idleness is the parent of all vice.” The idea of bunbo-ryodo emerged out of the samurai class in the sixteenth and seventeenth century supporting the ideal that young men should be skilled with both the pen and the sword.6 This fear of idleness is evident when the government shortened the school week to five days, eliminating Saturday classes, in an effort to give students more leisure time. The response was simply a shift to more work during the school days. Net time spent at juku, free-time activities, and with the family did not differ.6 In fact, many people criticized the law as being a “fatal mistake,” as did the governor of Tokyo, Shintaro Ishihara. He represented the concern of many parents that their children would fall behind by wasting the extra time on the weekend. The popularity of juku thrives on these ideals of that students should constantly be occupied, and that it is their duty to better themselves through education.

The desire of students to attend juku is rooted in their desire to succeed in an economic system that rewards those showing the best academic potential immediately prior to entering their college education. Even if one receives a better education at a lower-tier university, one will lose a position to a perhaps less-qualified applicant from a top-name university. One’s ability is measured supremely upon the difficulty of the entrance exam of one’s college. Subsequently, those that can perform better on exams are able to attain higher positions, hence the need for juku to tutor students in exam material. When this is combined with the commonly held fear that idleness of adolescents leads them into trouble, this pushes students to be constantly occupied with studies or other activities, limiting their own free time to nearly nothing. In addition, the system where information is taught without question in preparation for entrance exams causes students not to question the system. This combined with the standards for hiring maintains the undesirable system of “exam hell” in place. As long as the government and companies continue to rank universities, the demand for juku will never decrease.