Cabinet ministers agreed Mar. 20 on a proposed legislative measure to grant academic credit to high school students who participate in certain extracurricular activities.
Volunteer activities or hands-on experience in agriculture would be credited under the proposed revision, which the government plans to have made into law by the close of the 1997 fiscal year in March 1998. The agreement was made in a series of one-on-one ministerial talks with the chiefs of concerned ministries. The Cabinet will make a formal decision Mar. 28.
Kabun Muto, director general of the Management and Coordination Agency, and Education Minister Takashi Kosugi also agreed on the creation of correspondence postgraduate courses beginning in fiscal 1998. The ministers will hold further talks on a proposal to set up satellite-based university classes for company workers, aiming at a consensus in the next fiscal year.