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Alternative
Schools Offer Hope for 'Drop-outs' in Japan
By Suvendrini Kakuchi
Inter Press Service
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 TOKYO,
Apr 11 (IPS) - Tommy, 17, sports orange hair and wears baggy
pants, reasons, he says, why he was told by his middle-school
teacher that he is a misfit in a regular Japanese high school. |
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His Filipino mother, Elizabeth cites another reason her son
cannot cope: poor language skills. ''My Japanese husband was
working all the time so he could not teach Tommy even when
he was in elementary school. So, right from the beginning,
we were just looked upon as losers in the public school system,''
she says.
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But
not all is lost for Tommy and many others who do not seem
to fit into conventional learning institutions. Thanks to
alternative schools, a growing number of drop-outs from the
regular school system are not being deprived of education.
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''Tests are the basis for judging a child's intelligence.
Children who cannot cope are just ignored by the teachers,''
says Elizabeth.
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Tommy is now enrolled in a private ''free school'' which provides
a more liberal learning environment, but at the same time
follows a curriculum that is approved by education authorities.
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What's more, after finishing his term, he can apply for admission
in a Japanese university, a development, education specialists
say, represents a major change in the Japanese education system.
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''Twenty years ago, a child like Tommy, would either have
had to give up on a higher education or just force himself
to accept the public school system by studying harder. Today
Japanese children have a choice and that's a good reform,''
says Prof Naohiro Higuchi, a curriculum specialist at Rissho
University.
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Last year saw the debut of the Japan Free School Association,
an organisation set up to coordinate the rapidly growing number
of ''free'' schools, so called because of their non-rigid
standards. There are 240 schools registered with the group.
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The Education Ministry, which now recognises these learning
centres, says that 128,000 children, from 3 to 15 years old,
are now enrolled in alternative school systems. After intense
lobbying, the government six years ago allowed their graduates
to take tests for admission into universities and high schools.
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Free schools are commonly referred to as ''shelters'' by academics,
children and their parents because these institutions provide
a more caring alternative to public schools.
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Government statistics show that in 1998, children from elementary
and junior high schools who have been absent continuously
for 30 days reached a record high of 127,692, or 21.1 percent
higher than in the previous year.
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Officials
said the most common reasons for dropping out were bullying
and the students' inability to cope with demanding curricula
and the conventional classroom structure.
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More recently, another reason that was cited was boredom,
which experts say could be the result of children having to
deal with too much information.
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''The truancy problem is acute,'' says Michifumi Takasaki,
head of Takasaki Gakuen, established in 1973. ''These children
represent the dark side of Japanese education which ignores
the weak.''
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Takasaki says his school started out with three students and
has grown rapidly during the past decade to reach 50 children,
almost all of them escaping from the bullying they bore in
their regular schools.
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''They seek refuge in this school because the teachers spend
time talking to them and being their friends. Japanese schools
just force children to study and ignore their mental development,''
he says.
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Takasaki
says almost all the students in his school go on into regular
higher learning institutions. ''We nurture their confidence
by going slow on regular subjects such as math and Japanese
language and instead allow plenty of time for playing and
doing other activities such as art. The slower pace really
helps,'' he says.
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Another school which calls itself Dream Planet opened its
doors in April last year in Okinawa. Its founder, Shirai Tomoko,
a law graduate from the prestigious Tokyo University, describes
its curriculum as one that ''encourages children to find out
who they are''.
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'Tokyo Shure', established in 1985 and now has 200 students,
does not offer the conventional Japanese curriculum, and instead
has subjects like dance, sign language, and listening to lecturers
talk about their lives.
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Keiko Okuzaki, spokeswoman for the school says teachers do
not follow the regular system of grading. Instead, they are
more concerned with helping students to relax and learn to
smile more.
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The wide acceptance of the alternative school concept has
given rise to a new type: high schools that offer classes
on the Internet, many of which have sprung up recently.
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The @mark Learning Inc is a high school that allows students
to graduate by studying through the Internet. The school is
affiliated with Washington High School in the United States.
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The school has 20 new registrants between the ages of 16 and
35 years. Says Takeshi Yanagisawa, a teacher: ''Subjects are
chosen by the student who also decides on his own study timetable.
We hope to nurture students who value individuality, and away
from the group-oriented mentality of the Japanese.'' |
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Another just made its debut last April 1. EikohWeb International
School has five students. It is affiliated with the Eikoh Seminar,
a prestigious cram school providing tutoring services for students
from regular schools who are preparing for entrance examinations
to top universities. |
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''An alternative school follows a philosophy quite the opposite
of the cram schools. But we think the concept of individualised
learning will be very important in the future,'' says EikohWeb
spokesman Yasuo Yanagimachi. |
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This article
is free of copyright restrictions and can be reproduced provided
that Inter Press Service is credited. |
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