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Session Submission Summary

Internationalization of education in Japan: challenges and opportunities

Mon, April 15, 8:00 to 9:30am, Hyatt Regency, Floor: Pacific Concourse (Level -1), Pacific I

Group Submission Type: Formal Panel Session

Proposal

Internationalization is one of the strategies used globally to reform higher education (Sadlak, 2000). In Japan, internationalization is used as an educational reform to overcome challenges that Japanese society and schools have been facing. In the 1980s, the Japanese government became strongly interested in internationalization when its declining birth rate and increasing aging population (Boocock, 2011) resulted in domestic labor shortages. Japan “inevitably” opened its labor market to foreign nationals to sustain the country. However, despite this rapid societal change, the government seems to focus mainly on its own economic benefits. The purpose of this panel discussion is to examine and analyze internationalization of education in Japan. Each panel will cover the current educational reform and its benefits and challenges. Baoyan Cheng who specializes in international relations and global education in East Asia region, will serve as the discussant.

Shimojima will discuss purposes and challenges of the Super Global High School (SGH) program as project-based learning for fostering future global leaders in Japan. The SGH program started in 2014 and helps Japanese high school students develop critical thinking skills, global perspectives, and resiliency (MEXT, 2016). Students in the SGH program become global individuals who have open-mindedness and interact with a diverse set of people effectively. However, some challenges have been identified. The program seems to focus mainly on Japanese citizens even though there are Japanese language learners (JLLs) and culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students. Some CLD students are still in the process of acquiring Japanese language and need to have support from teachers and their peers. Another challenge is that some teachers in the SGH program were eager to teach in inquiry-based learning styles, but other teachers were reluctant to teach in unconventional styles (Shimojima, 2018). Teachers need further professional development for working with diverse students. The SGH program brings opportunities for high school students to become global leaders. To evaluate challenges in the current SGH program, high school students including CLD and JLLs will benefit from the advanced internationalization program in the future.

McCarthy will examine the equity of education that foreign-national students encounter in educational reforms in Japan. Many foreign-national students lack Japanese literacy and are unable to speak Japanese (Burgess, 2011; Kanno, 2003) and as a result, they are left behind in school. The Japanese as a Second Language (JSL) curriculum developed in 2001 (MEXT, 2001) was officially applied to foreign-national populated schools in 2007 (MEXT 2010). Although the number of foreign-national populated schools has increased, the rate of implementation of the JSL curriculum has decreased in 2014 (MEXT, 2016). In addition, the quality of qualified teachers is scarce. On the other hand, English education for Japanese students has become a part of the Courses of Study (MEXT 2016). In 2018, 92.1 percent of public elementary schools have implemented English classes (MEXT 2018a). Although internationalization reform allows Japanese students to have opportunities to advance their English proficiency in Japanese education, foreign-national students have less opportunities and face challenges improving their Japanese proficiency. The challenge of internationalization reform is to reduce gaps of equity in education between Japanese and foreign-national students.

Ida will explore benefits and challenges of International Baccalaureate (IB) programs in Japan. The implementation of these programs is a part of the Japanese government’s strategy since 2013 to produce individuals with global mindsets. The aim of IB education is to “develop inquiring, knowledgeable and caring young people who help to create a better and more peaceful world through intercultural understanding and respect” (IBO, 2018). Benefits of IB education include developing students’ 21st century skills and preparing them for post-secondary education. As these benefits indicate, skills cultivated through IB education will prepare high school students in Japan for a new college entrance exam in 2020 that will assess students’ “power of thinking, judgment and expression” (Mccrostie, 2017). A major challenge of IB education is the potential for increasing educational inequality. Its high costs for schools to be authorized and to maintain its affiliation increase the tuition, creating a barrier for students who cannot afford the tuition of IB programs. Cases of “inequalities in participation” (Bowen et al., 2005) are found in Australia, where IB schools are located in affluent areas where only families with high socioeconomic status live and where IB education has become “an indicator of new and emerging forms of social differentiation” (Outhwaite & Ferri, 2017, p. 413). Further discussion and action among stakeholders to address concerns and negative outcomes of the current program, including educational inequality, and especially “inequalities in participation”, is needed.

Watanabe will talk about philosophy for children Hawai’i (p4cHI) and its introduction to educators in Miyagi prefecture in northeastern Japan. “p4cHI” is an approach which aims to nurture children's sense of wonder and inquiry in the world through communities of inquiry. This approach was developed by Thomas Jackson, a specialist and educator at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. p4cHI tries to transform relationships between teachers and students through philosophical inquiries in order to create intellectually safe communities in schools (Jackson, 2017). Educators in Miyagi prefecture have been practicing p4cHI in order to rebuild communities in schools after the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011. Watanabe will conduct interviews with three educators who are doing p4cHI in Miyagi prefecture, and examine their opportunities and challenges in their practices. This study aims to examine the effects of applying an educational construct created in America (Hawaii) to the Japanese education system (Miyagi prefecture). To this end, Watanabe will examine how the opportunities and challenges of implementing p4cHI in their own practices have influenced teachers’ perceptions in Miyagi prefecture.

Internationalization of educational reforms provides great benefits for students. Programs and initiatives such as SGH, JSL, and IB program will foster students to become global leaders. p4cHI fosters the ideas behind these reforms and helps to transform relationships between teachers and students. Various challenges are also identified in each reform. However, addressing these challenges can help to improve and create new programs from which not only Japanese benefit, but also Japanese-learning foreign nationals.

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