Dear former international students,

 

Since September this year, I have been appointed to the post responsible for international students in Japan. I joined the Japan Student Services Organization in April this year. For about three years prior to this, I had been involved in sports administration in the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. As its name suggests, the ministry handles a wide variety of topics from education, academic matters and science and technology to sports and cultures. Though I experienced many things while I was in the ministry, the efforts to stage the next 2016 Summer Olympics in Tokyo stand out. In this report, I would like to talk about them.

As you know, the Olympic Games took place in Beijing, China, this summer. The Games began with a grand opening ceremony held at a national gymnasium, dubbed the Bird’s Nest, at 8 p.m. on Aug.8. A total of about 11,000 athletes representing a record high 204 nations and regions competed in 302 events of 28 types of competitions. The Games ended in great success. It was the third time that the Summer Games were held in Asia; the first took place in Tokyo in 1964, and the second in Seoul in 1988.

 

London, the U.K., will be the next site for the Summer Olympics in 2012, but competition has already been heating up to become the Olympic site after that. Tokyo has declared its candidacy as the site for the post-London Summer Games to be staged in 2016. Besides Tokyo, Madrid of Spain, Rio de Janeiro of Brazil, and Chicago of the U.S. have also declared their candidacy to become the host city for the 2016 Summer Games. The final decision on the Olympic site will be made at the general meeting of the International Olympic Committee on Oct.2 next year. Until that time, competition is expected to become increasingly intense among these candidate cities.

 

The Tokyo plan is to arrange all the facilities, except for target shooting and some other events, within an 8km zone centered at the Olympic stadium to be built on the coast of Tokyo Bay. As this plan suggests, the Olympics in Tokyo, if they should be held there, would be rather compact, to be staged at the center of a huge metropolis. The stadium would be a place not only for both the opening and closing ceremonies, but for athletics and football games. During the Olympic period, people from all over the world would be flocking to the Games site at the Japanese capital, promoting exchanges on a global scale.

As the expected construction site of the Olympic stadium is near the Tokyo International Exchange Center in Odaiba, those of you who once lived here may have a clear image of the place. For an enlarged local map, click Musubi Cluster on the TOKYO2016 Interactive Venue Map.

The Yurikomome line that passes by the Tokyo International Exchange Center was extended from Ariake to Toyosu in 2006. On this extended line are three new stations—Ariake-Tennis-no-mori, Shijo-mae, and Shin-Toyosu.

 

Starting at Ariake toward Toyosu on the Yurikamome line, you can see on both sides of Ariake-Tennis-no-mori the plots of land, an expected site for the construction of an Olympic village for athletes. Before the line turns sharply to the right almost 90 degrees before Shijo-mae, you can see right in front the smokestack of a garbage disposal factory, a landmark in this area. The vast land next to it is a likely site to build the Olympic stadium. There is a long bridge over a channel from the wharf of the planned construction site. A road is expected to be built over the bridge, linking the stadium and the athletes’ village. If Tokyo is chosen as the 2016 Olympic venue, views seen from Yurikamome will likely be much different.

 

Areas near the Odaiba coastal park are set aside for triathlon and beach volleyball. The Tokyo Big Site is for fencing, handball, and tae kwon do, and Ariake Tennis no Mori Park is for tennis.

 

As you spent a rather long time in Japan, you may have several Japanese scenes firmly etched in your memories. If the 2016 Summer Games should be held in Japan, the world would have a close look at Japanese scenes centered on Tokyo. You may recall some of the Japanese scenes you saw from your memories as you watch the images of the Olympics. I would like to end this message by wishing Tokyo a success in its bid to become the host city for the Summer Games.

Best wishes to you and your health.

 

Reference web page: TOKYO 2016 Bid Committee

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How was your summer vacation? I spent my summer vacation with my family in Guam. It was my first trip to Guam, and I was very surprised to see a lot of sea cucumbers on the beach.

 

When the editor of this newsletter asked me to write about “something familiar and not very formal” for this issue, it was not about sea cucumbers but about tofu (bean curd) that came up to mind. After graduating from university in Japan, I had opportunities to study abroad and I remember that I found white cheese which looked very much like tofu in Portugal, the first foreign country where I studied.

 

Those days, I was studying in a small town named Coimbra where there had been a monastery, the precursor of the University of Coimbra, long time ago. A Japanese student whose Christian name was Bernardo used to study at the university as well. Francisco de Xavier accompanied him on his way back from Kagoshima, Japan, in 1551. He is actually said to be the first Japanese student who ever studied in Europe. After Bernardo, some teenage boys on the Japanese Mission to Europe sailed from Nagasaki to Portugal in 1582.

 

It is said that the first Japanese oversea students were among the Imperial embassies to China (to Sui Dynasty and to Tang Dynasty) in the seventh century AD. Moreover, after Japan concluded a treaty of amity or a treaty of amity and commerce with western powers in the end of Edo Period, the Tokugawa shogunate and the Meiji government sent students to Europe and the United States. In 1871, the first girl students including Ume Tsuda and other four girls were sent to the United States of America. Ume Tsuda (later changed to Umeko), the founder of Tsuda College, was just six years old at that time.

 

Let me please write about foreign students who were studying in Japan. There is a record about the first government-sponsored students. They were 13 students from Qing Dynasty China came to Japan in 1896 after the Sino-Japanese war. By the year 1906 after the Russo-Japanese war, the number of students from Qing China reached 8600 in total. Therefore, the number of students from Qing China alone had almost reached the number of all the overseas students in Japan 80 years later in 1983 when the so-called “100,000 Foreign Student Plan” was announced and the number of foreign students in Japan was about 10,000. Then, in 1902, Student House of Qing China was built in Suzukicho, Kanda-Surugadai, Tokyo.

 

In more recent years, the Japanese government scholarship student system was established in 1954 after the War. In 1957, Association of International Education, Japan in Komaba, Meguro, Tokyo, and Asian Students Cultural Association in Honkomagome, Bunkyo, Tokyo, were established, which resulted in building dormitories for international students. Prior to the establishment of these associations above, International Students Institute was founded in 1935 before the War, and Kansai International Students Institute was founded in 1956. The Students’ Assistance Association that was originally established as the Mobilized Students’ Assistance Association in 1945, was renamed as the Center for Domestic and Foreign Students in 1989.

 

JASSO today has just started working on the “300,000 Foreign Student Plan.” We have three short-term tasks. The first task is regarding FCE (Foreign Credential Evaluation). FCE facilitates accurate evaluation of academic degrees and credits foreign students earned at foreign schools so that it becomes easier for foreign students to enter or to transfer to Japanese University. This system is very important for foreign students who would like to get admission to Japanese University without coming to Japan to take examination, and advanced countries except for Japan have accepted foreign students for a long time by utilizing both this system and examination conducted abroad. It is true that Japanese students can get admission to foreign University without having to go to the country to take examination thanks to this system.

 

The second task is to conduct the Examination for Japanese University Admission for International Students (EJU) in China. We are aiming at giving EJU especially for students who major in math and science because they don’t need to take the subject of “Japan and the World” (about history and politics, so the subject is what you can call social studies). If we achieve this and the first task about FCE, we can get much closer to the target number 300,000.

 

The third task is to have well-established career path for an expert of international student exchange program in place. It is a task to clarify the career path of a person who starts working in his or her 20’s and continue working until the retirement age, in other words to clarify the person’s career path roughly between 25 and 65 years of age. For example, if you join JASSO at the age of 25, you will become the head of the student exchange center of a university at the age of 65, or you might as well start working at administration office of a university and will move into managerial positions at JASSO when you are 65 years old. I believe, if we can clearly show the work design or the life plan, more talented people than ever will join our international student exchange world.

 

If above three points I have written are attained, it does not sound so difficult to realize the target of 300,000 by the year 2020. This is what I have in mind today.

 

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My greetings to international students who studied in Japan. I expect that all of you have been active back home in academic and business endeavors. In the past two years, I’ve been in charge of international student affairs at Japan Student Services Organization (JASSO), while serving as the curator of Tokyo International Exchange Center in Odaiba since April this year.

 

Today, the “300,000 International Students Plan” referred to by Prime Minister Fukuda during his policy speech in January is causing quite a stir not only in the academic circle, but also among the general public.

 

In 1983, when the number of international students in Japan was just around 10,000, then Prime Minister Nakasone’s Cabinet released a plan to increase the number to 100,000 by the early 21st century. Twenty years later, in 2003, their numbers reached 100,000 owing to the steady efforts of universities, the government’s scholarship programs, and improved accommodations. Such an increase in the number of international students, however, is not without problems including illegal work. After this 100,000 figure was attained, the emphasis began to shift from quantity to quality, also focusing on nurturing Japanese international students with an international viewpoint.

 

In this sense, Prime Minister Fukuda’s new plan is a step forward to the acquisition of able human resources from the earlier emphasis on receiving students from abroad as a means of providing educational support to developing nations.

 

The door to employment will be wide open to those who have acquired high-level knowledge and skills at their universities and other places of learning—they can improve their career status in businesses and schools. These prospects can be a large incentive to students who plan to study in Japan. For Japan as a receiving country, it is beneficial to usher these international students into businesses and schools so as to vitalize the Japanese society and promote its globalization. It will be most welcome if their acclimation in Japan helps maintain and enhance the competitiveness of the industry and the state.

 

Currently, a special committee on international students at the Central Council for Education is working on concrete measures to make the country ready for 300,000 international students by around 2020. Major topics are as follows: (1) Enhancement of basic functions (providing information on studying in Japan, teaching of the Japanese language abroad) to receive highly qualified international students; (2) Globalization of university teaching systems and overseas recruiting; (3) Safe and attractive systems for international students (a support organization for international students from their entry into college to finding jobs after graduation; scholarships and housing (4) Globalization of the Japanese society (promotion of employment, exchanges by local citizens and businesses); and (5) Development of Japanese students through overseas studies who can be active on an international stage.

 

With these measures, we can recheck the processes from entry into university to employment after graduation for international students, regardless of whether they come to Japan using their own private funds or they are from developing nations on the government’s scholarship programs. Priorities for these measures are determined based on the answers to the following questions: (1) Do they improve the convenience for international students and lead to their satisfaction? (2) Do they heighten the incentives for able international students to come and study in Japan? (3) Will they be effective and efficient over a mid/long term?

 

As for the preparations for receiving a large number of international students, universities that accept them naturally take the initiative, but government offices and businesses should also cooperate in devising plans. These plans may necessitate changes or corrections in existing rules, common sense, and relevant systems in various fields, exerting financial and psychological burdens on those involved at universities, government offices, and businesses. Considering this, we need to promote the understanding of and participating by the general public.

 

Needless to say, it is necessary to pursue economic benefits for both international students and the recipient nation in a timely manner. It should be noted, however, that young international students as individuals strive to raise the level of mutual understanding and friendship through an interaction with other students and teachers. This is the very basis of international exchanges. Economic benefits are not the only reason for us to receive these international students. Rather, the purpose is to help them gain sustainable satisfaction from making academic achievements, meeting people, and experiencing cultures so that they can grow into pro-Japan individuals with superb knowledge about the country.

 

We intend to help international students not only in education and finding jobs, but also with measures to improve intangible results by offering them with opportunities to meet people as individuals. We welcome advice and ideas from former international students about improving the situation of studying in Japan. With such advice, we strive to make sure that those international students will have the greater fruit of their stay in Japan.

 

With my best wishes for your health and increasing success.

Yours truly,

Norikazu Minoshima
Vice President, Japan Student Services Organization (JASSO)

 

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Hello, everyone. How are you?

 

I’m writing this message at Tokyo International Exchange Center in Odaiba that provides lodging to JASSO international students. The center accommodates about 800 students who come from some 70 countries and regions including Japan. As many of them are couples and families, children are often seen playing in the field during days off.

 

The primary objective of the center is to provide these students with a comfortable space for living, but I strongly feel the need for promoting exchanges among the resident students. These students of different nationalities and backgrounds happen to share the time and space at the center, and this coincidence should be exploited. You come to Japan from different parts of the world and just happen to live in the center. I constantly feel that, through this unexpected occurrence, the students should try to get to know one another better and step up exchanges. They can become friends through growing rapport—this is one of the big advantages of staying together at the center. To create and enhance rapport, we try to make many opportunities where all the students get together and know one another, such as culture fairs, sports meets, study sessions on Japanese cultures, and presentation of research results.

 

Now, take a look back at our planet, and we find that it is fraught with many problems including wars, terrorism, environmental pollutions, poverty, hunger, difficult-to-treat diseases, and global warming. When we entered the new century, all of us expected a dawn of new age, but the future prospects are dim with some scientists even predicting the demise of mankind during the 21st century. I’m sure I’m not alone to have this rather cloudy picture of the future. To overcome these difficulties, all of us on this planet need to get together and act. For such cooperation on the global scale, mutual understanding is said to be essential.

 

The world seems smaller amid a phenomenon called globalization, but it is the place of many different cultures and peoples and a different sense of value. Not only scientists, but also ordinary people recognize the existence of other cultures. It is not difficult to understand that our cultures differ from others’. In fact, the cultural diversity is the highest value of human society. It is simply priceless. Our lives would be bland if all the people around the world shared the same cultures. In such an inorganic society, no literary activities or artistic works could be expected. No enterprising spirit, an important feature of mankind, could arise. In this sense, the cultural diversity is essential and should not be denied.

 

It is not very difficult to recognize cultural differences, i.e. to know that other cultures are not the same as ours. Such differences can be learned through books and other media, or one can travel to foreign countries to experience them first hand. But what lies beyond “knowing the differences” poses more difficulties. After “knowing” comes “understanding.” It is to understand different cultures. It is easy to say, but difficult to do. For instance, frogs are considered a delicacy in some societies. You know this practice, but it is a different matter to actually try it by yourself. When asked to eat the frog, you may find it unfit for consumption or find the taste revolting. We need to study this difference between knowing and understanding further.

 

Cultural relativism is a belief that stifles discussions on cultural superiority and the degree of progress. It recognizes value in all kinds of culture, but I see a limit to this kind of thinking. We may recognize high value in some societies, but, from the global point of view, we fail to recognize it in some cases. In a human society, there must be value that applies to all kinds of society. If such value is called “universality,” then we ought to make efforts to pursue it. It is extremely difficult to identify this universal value, but we need to pursue it. But it is no good to unilaterally or forcibly declare that our culture is universal. Needless to say, we ought to explain it in a way satisfactory to others. We need to make efforts to increase the number of people who understand the concept of universality.

 

Pay respect to “individuality=culture” while steadily pursue “universality” at the same time. This is easier said than done, but, by doing so, we can open the way that leads to a bright century. A practical method to find the way is human rapport. By all means, we should pursue rapport in whatever forms. I firmly believe that the rapport of people, which crosses races, societies, genders, and affiliations, is the most practical way, though slow, to understand different cultures and peoples.

 

As you have and had opportunities to study abroad, all of you are outstanding in practicing this human rapport. In other words, you have obligation to practice it. I urge you all to spread the circle of rapport, starting from tiny things around you, based on what you have learned in Japan. I firmly believe that it is this rapport that will save the world.

 

I wish all of you the best of health and prosperity from Tokyo International Exchange Center in Odaiba, Tokyo.

 

 

Yours truly,

 

 

Osamu Akagi
Superintendent of Tokyo International Exchange Center and councilor to Japan Student Services Organization

 

 

Photos by Susumu Sasaki

 

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Dear students who once studied in Japan,

 

A Happy New Year to you all. I’m sure you’ve all enjoyed the New Year. This newsletter, established to continue long-lasting relationships with you who have now returned home, has also entered the New Year in its fourth installment.

 

Before I became JASSO president, I was a Japanese language teacher at a university. I met many international students, who increased in number reflecting the changes in the times. First, there were many students from Taiwan and Korea, but the number of Chinese students jumped at a certain time. Those students were initially interested in learning the Japanese language, but later began pursuing a variety of other subjects such as cultures, economy, science, agriculture, engineering, and medicine.

 

Nowadays at Japanese universities, classes are increasingly taught in English. But many of you who have studied in Japan must have mastered Japanese first before pursuing your specialties.

 

Some of these students who learned the Japanese language from me have since taken prominent posts back home, such as the chairmanships of the Society of Japanese Studies in Korea and the Society of Japanese Linguistic Studies in China. Some other former students are translating into Chinese a Japanese dictionary that I helped compile. I also would give lectures and special seminars in Taiwan, Korea, and China, and sit on a panel to examine academic papers on the Japanese language at local universities.

               

While I was the president of Tsukuba University, I would often visit other countries to exchange ideas and research results. I particularly remember Tunisia in North Africa where I have developed a deep tie.

 

Since I became JASSO president, I visited Malaysia, Thailand, and some Western nations to promote Japan Education Fairs. Everywhere I went, former students who once learned in Japan would come over and help me out as interpreters and in other ways.

 

“Each in its own way was…unforgettable…it would be difficult to (choose one).  I will cherish my visit here in memory as long as I live.”  These words as I remember were said by Princess Ann, played by Audrey Hepburn, when asked by a reporter, “Which of the cities visited did Your Highness enjoy the most?” in the movie “Roman Holiday”.  I feel exactly the same way.

 

After having visited so many countries, I in my advanced age wish that I had had opportunities to learn foreign languages first hand and speak them fluently. How I would have been happy if I had done that. When I was a student, there were off course English classes and other foreign languages could be learned, but there were no foreigners nearby. There were hardly any chances to go abroad. Under such circumstances, those who specialized in Japanese did not feel much need to study a foreign language.

 

For some reasons, you came to Japan and learned in this country rich in traditional cultures. An island nation, Japan has long been cushioned from foreign influences and been able to nurture its own cultures. We often hear a word “globalization,” but it does not mean to neglect national cultures and characteristics that should be continued. Urban streets begin to look alike from one nation to another, but distinct national characteristics are still felt in many rural areas. Japanese cultures are deep no matter where they have grown—in fact, many international students have married Japanese after they became “hooked” on Japan. One of them became a proprietress at a Japanese inn and others became experts in “noh” (traditional Japanese musical dance-drama) and “rakugo” (traditional comic storytelling).

 

My specialty “language” is also deep. Its structure and rules are beautiful. Old languages and new words that come into being daily—it is a pleasure to try to find the God’s rules that govern them.

 

Those of you who have studied here are very important resources for both countries. You are the root of international exchanges as any one of you is a civilian ambassador. It is you who can promote international exchanges and span a bridge of people and heart between the two countries. And it is our important task to support your activities.

 

It is our great pleasure that international students go home feeling that “Japan was a good country.” No war could ever break out between countries where international exchanges are active through international students. Princess Ann in the movie also said, “I have every faith in (friendship among nations), as I have faith in relations between people.”

 

I firmly believe that exchanges of international students will eventually lead to peace in the world.

 

May this year bring peace to you and all the people in the world!

 

President Yasuo Kitahara

Japan Student Services Organization

 

 

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