Last week in Counterpoint I wrote about the three deep gaps crisscrossing this country, turning it into a kakusa shakai (society of disparities). These rifts, amply recognized today among the populace and in the media, are: the income, or wealth, gap; the goal gap; and the education gap.

Only one of these can bridge the other two. Only one of them is the vehicle that has the potential to propel Japan forward once again into the vangard of advanced nations. This is education.

There are many moves afoot to reform the creaking, rust-encrusted structures of tertiary education in Japan. The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology has been encouraging universities to bolster their international credentials by, among other means, vastly increasing the number of foreign teaching staff and the number of subjects taught in English. (Why, however, this ministry is wearing more hats than a Ringling Bros. circus clown is beyond me. It's as if education today weren't sufficient in itself to merit ministry status.)