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COMMENTARY
May 12, 2008

Economics studies suffer as math focus diminishes

There has been a sharp decrease in the number of students who major in natural sciences in their undergraduate years and then take up economics in postgraduate courses. I will attempt to identify the reasons.
COMMENTARY
Feb 21, 2008

Aussie personalist diplomacy

Australia is never short of surprises. One is the way it has produced a prime minister, Kevin Rudd, who can talk directly with the Chinese leadership in their language. Reports say his Mandarin Chinese is excellent.
Reader Mail
Nov 29, 2007

Try listening to the teachers

Regarding the Nov. 23 article "Japan's schools flunking at global level": Calls for reform by politicians and university administrators uniformly cite lack of competitiveness and the failure to meet international standards in support of often untested reforms. Throughout my university career that included...
COMMENTARY
Oct 8, 2007

Save cramming for college

On Aug. 30, the elementary-school group of the Central Education Council published a draft report to the education minister that included these points:
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Sep 18, 2007

Looking on the bright side

Last in a two-part series
Reader Mail
Sep 5, 2007

Beware the sponsors of education

Shinichi Terada's implication in his Aug. 17 article, "Rural universities feel pinch of lower enrollments," that the economic troubles of many Japanese universities might be alleviated by applying more market-friendly approaches to their institutional structures and courses of study indicates a frightening...
JAPAN
Jun 3, 2007

Education reform proposals draw praise, criticism

Recommendations by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's advisory panel on education reform has drawn praise from some quarters, but other experts are questioning whether the proposals will be effective in improving the quality of public education.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Apr 21, 2007

Accidental president has a history with change

Toyoki Kozai is surprised to find himself president of Chiba University. He would rather have been a farmer, he insists, growing things.
COMMENTARY
Jan 1, 2007

Unwise gantlet for teachers

Certain professionals must pass state examinations to obtain licenses for their jobs. They include medical doctors, dentists, jurists, certified public accountants, architects, pharmacists and registered nurses, as well as primary, middle and high school teachers. Amid the severe employment situation,...
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 25, 2006

Enabling Islamic science to be born again

WASHINGTON -- For a few hundred years, when science and mathematics were enjoying a period of great invention, one region of the world stood out. Masters of these disciplines were revered, medicine advanced quickly and the average person was curious about how nature worked. Not surprisingly, this region...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Dec 5, 2006

There's no need to grit your teeth

It has all the elements of a nightmare. A masked person stands over you wielding a small mirror in one gloved hand and a needle-sharp probe in the other. A drill powerful enough to cut through bone in seconds sits idle on a table beside other implements of torture. You cannot see the masked face clearly...
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 8, 2006

Expected behavior in a school jungle

That large clucking sound you are hearing is the sound of breakdowns in Japan's over-regulated education system forcing some very large chickens to come home and roost in the Kasumigaseki premises of Japan's conservative education ministry, MEXT.
JAPAN
Sep 1, 2006

Abe mulls school-year shift, forced volunteerism

Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe, the front-runner in the prime minister's race, wants to make state universities start classes in September instead of April and demand six months of volunteer work as a prerequisite for enrollment, sources close to him said Wednesday.
JAPAN
Jun 15, 2006

Panel asks for student-teacher screening rules

A government advisory panel has drawn up a report urging universities to send only students with a genuine desire to teach to elementary, junior high and high schools for training, because unmotivated students cause problems for school staff, panel members said Wednesday.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
May 7, 2006

Japanese being ensnared in ill-suited U.S. trappings

Back in the 1960s and '70s, the Japanese people were being raked over the coals from West Virginia to the Ruhr Valley and beyond for, chiefly, two things.
COMMENTARY
Apr 27, 2006

Has Japan changed for better?

LONDON -- Some people complain that Japanese society has deteriorated with the ending of the lifetime employment system and the replacement of seniority-based promotion systems with ones based on performance.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Mar 5, 2006

Chizuko Ueno: Speaking up for her sex

In the United States today, it is no longer radical to suggest that the next president could be a woman. In Nordic countries, no husband would rail at a pregnant wife who expected him to share child-raising duties. And female heads of state are now found the world over.
JAPAN
Nov 29, 2005

Students boast second satellite success

, a professor at the University of Tokyo, and Ryu Funahashi, leader of a group of graduate students who made a tiny cubical satellite, shown in bottom photo provided by Nakasuka, weep with joy Oct. 27 after the first signal from the craft was received as it passed over Japan.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 22, 2005

Cry for about-face in China

BEIJING -- These are interesting times in China. The political climate is changing; it has been for some time, but now the direction of change is becoming clear.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Nov 21, 2005

China far way from becoming global technology powerhouse

China has come a long way to show "pockets of excellence" in some fields of science and technology, but it still has a long way to go before it can become a full-blown innovative power, a China expert at a U.S. think tank told a recent symposium in Tokyo.
JAPAN
Jul 10, 2005

University presidents take voluntary salary cuts

The heads of 10 national universities that acquired corporate status in spring 2004 have voluntarily cut their pay in an effort to promote business efficiency, it was learned Saturday.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 14, 2005

Japan's beneficent potential

During my 7 1/2 years of service in the 1990s as deputy secretary general of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, I initiated a research project that produced, in 1997, a report titled "The World in 2020: Toward a New Global Age." In the course of this research I assumed that the...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Jun 5, 2005

Seiji Hirao: Mr. Rugby

At the Rugby World Cup Sevens in Hong Kong in March, a group of eminent rugby journalists were talking about Japan's bid to host Rugby World Cup 2011.

Longform

Mount Fuji is considered one of Japan's most iconic symbols and is a major draw for tourists. It's still a mountain, though, and potential hikers need to properly prepare for any climb.
What it takes to save lives on Mount Fuji