1. juku
Juku means “cramming school” in English. In Japan preparation for competitive entrance examinations requires a lot of energy and financial resources. It consumes the energy of the students and their mothers if not the whole family. As a consequence, both parents and students see the goal of education at each level is to successfully pass entrance examinations for a good school. And this is where cramming schools, known as jukus — gakushuu jukus or shingaku jukus — and yobiko come into play.
Juku is a privately run education service offered for a fee. They come in all sizes. Some jukus are run by an individual. Some others are run by a business entity with a large number of teachers. In some schools, teachers are actively recruited, and in some other schools college and university students are hired. School children come to study at juku after school during the week and sometimes during weekends as well.
The exact number of jukus and the number of students enrolled in the programs are unknown since the government statistics do not show any figure. In theory, there is no need for supplementary education of school subjects. The only primary agencies of formal education are regular schools. Therefore, there is no recognition of these education services by the government ministry or by the accredited schools.
The decision to go to jukus is made by the students themselves and by the parents.
For more information about juku, please visit http://jin.jcic.or.jp/insight/html/focus06/school_education/supplementary_education.html.
2. University of Tokyo
The University of Tokyo is a national university operated under the auspices of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan. It offers courses in essentially all academic disciplines at both undergraduate and graduate levels and provides research facilities for these disciplines.
The university has a faculty of approximately 28,000 professors, associate professors, and lecturers, and a total student enrollment of about 27,000. There are about 2,100 international students, and about 1,600 foreign scholars who come to the university for short or extended visits. The university is known for the excellence of its faculty and students; many of its graduates are and have always been leaders in the government, in business, and in the academic world.
For more information, please visit http://www.u-tokyo.ac.jp/eng/gaiyou/index.html. 3. Tokyo
The capital city of Japan. For information about Tokyo, please visit http://www.metro.tokyo.jp. 4. Japan Teachers Union
You can visit http://www.jtu-net.or.jp for more information about the union (note that the website is in Japanese only).
The Pressure to Succeed from an Earlier Age 背景知识(background info)
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