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exams. Pick up any of Japan's national newsmagazines in early spring, and you are certain to find the lead
story to be about these examinations. For a brief time each year the ordeal of getting into college surpasses
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political scandals, international economic problems, and gossip about entertainers as the matter most inter-
esting and important to the reading public. Imagine Time and Newsweek each publishing thirty or so pages
of statistics documenting the secondary school origins of new entrants to hundreds of universities, along
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with details of the tests, competition ratios, and no table study techniques. All this attention (and anxiety)
attests to the centrality of entrance examinations to Japanese society. Schooling is geared to it, jobs are
based on it, and families are preoccupied with it. The obsession with entrance exams' is like a dark engine
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powering the entire school system. High national standards and entrance exams combine with a great
popular thirst for the benefits of education.
7.Economic prosperity has greatly bolstered the demand for education — and the level of
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competitiveness — beyond the imagination of Americans. Accession rates to Japanese high schools and
universities have increased rapidly over the last quarter century. In 1950, only 43 percent of all fifteen-
year-olds were going on to high school, whereas by 1975 the figure had risen to 98 percent. In 1950, only 7
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percent of college-age Japanese enrolled in higher education; today more than 40 percent are going on to
universities or junior colleges. The university population has swollen from about half a million in 1950 to
nearly two million. Universities are clearly overcrowded and the quality of education has suffered greatly.
100 Only at the levels of higher and graduate education does our system stand out as comparatively strong.
8.Despite such problems, the ratio of candidates to openings at almost any Japanese university starts at 3
to I and rises to an average of 5 to I. Many private universities attract eight or nine candidates per opening,
105 and competition to gain entrance to departments that lead to degrees in medicine regularly reaches a ratio
of 20 to 1. The national total of applicant, furthermore, annually exceeds the number of university openings
by approximately 200,000. The competition has grown excessive.
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9. Many who fail to enter the school of their choice decide to try again. They join a particular category of
students who have graduated from high school but have not yet entered college. The main occupation of
115 this group is cramming for the next annual round of entrance examinations. (As with the ancient Chinese
exam system, there is no limit on how many times one may try and no age limit on applications). Known as
ronin because they are akin to the wandering, disenfranchised warrior-heroes made familiar by samurai
120 movies, these students are very largely male and usually academically talented. Attracted to the best
universities, they prefer to persevere even for several years rather than to accept a place at a lesser univer-
sity. Their lonely pursuit of fame and glory is often romanticized, but, in fact, it is a dreary, expensive
125 existence. The annual ronin population is estimated at 140,000 young people, and approximately one in
every five male high-school graduates is fated to join this particular detour in the system. At the prestigious
Tokyo University, roughly half of the successful applicants enter on the first try, one-third on the second,
130 and 10 percent after three or more tries. Each year someone succeeds on his sixth or seventh attempt.
10.What kinds of examinations are involved? Composed almost entirely of multiple-choice and short-
answer questions, the exams are designed to test (1) the comprehension of mathematical (highschool math
135 goes beyond trigonometry) and scientific principles (physics, chemistry, biology, and earth sciences are
required), and (2) the mastery of enormous bodies of factual material. Economics, geography, history
(European, Japanese, Chinese, and United States), and English (six years) are required subjects. Every
140 question has but one correct answer. Interpretive skills are not tested, but skills in math and science
problem solving are important, and the degree of detailed knowledge required can be astounding. The level
of factual knowledge necessary in the history sections of the exams for the best universities would tax
145 American graduate students. In sum, the exams are of the kind for which a capacity to grind away for years
in preparation makes a difference. Intelligence is quite necessary, but self-discipline and willpower are
equally essential. Furthermore, only the exam results count toward admission. Highschool grades,
150 extracurricular activities, teachers' recommendations, and special talents play virtually no role, except in a
very small percentags of experimental cases. It is hard to estimate just what percentage of all the energy ex-
pended is wasted on useless cramming, but it is consequential.
155 11. Nothing better illustrates the pressure to begin preparations early than the popularity of cram schools,
or juku, which today enroll one in three middle-school students and one in four upper-elementary-school
students across Japan. In Tokyo and other large cities, fully two-thirds of all seventh, eighth, and ninth
160 graders are either attending cram schools or being tutored at home. Juku are privately run, after-school
academies designed to supplement public education. There are juku for slow students, juku for average
students, and juku for bright students, in part because the public system has no gifted programs, eschews