work in Japan
Hi friends! I am an Italian student and I am about to graduate in Japanese Studies (still 21 years old, as in Italy bachelors are three years). I spent a semester abroad at Keio University, passed N1, have a 3.97/4 GPA, attended an honors school, and have done an internship here and a few more in Italy.
The thing is, as much as I love my major I understand it does not qualify for any job in Japan aside from translation (which I actually really like, but it’s not going to pay bills you know), so I’d like to pursue a Master’s degree (possibly in Japan).
Rn my options are the following:
-Do a Master’s Degree rough MEXT: as Masters in Japan are research-oriented I would pick a humanities-related field. Aiming at national universities like Kyoto and Osaka.
-Joint Master’s Degree between Kyoto University and Heidelberg (German scholarships are way easier to get and the program seems very nice).
-Master’s in Japanese Language and Economics at my university in Italy (with another semester/one year abroad in Japan).
-Gap Year in Italy to earn enough money to pay my Master’s Degree in Japan.
After living in Japan almost one year I realized that my goal is to find a way to get a qualified job here and a decent visa, but I am struggling to make a choice between the options above.
Here are some questions for you kind souls to answer:
Do you think there is a stigma around taking a gap year to earn money for Graduate School in Japan? Would I be too old at 23 to start a Master’s Degree and would subsequently struggle to find a job even after graduating from a Japanese University?
I’m trying to understand whether, if I don’t manage to get MEXT scholarship, it would be better to get a master’s degree in Italy anyway or to spend one year working to major in Japan.
2) Does a Joint Degree qualify as a Japanese degree for visa purposes?
3) Do Japanese companies care for what you studied in college? If I graduate from more research-oriented programs or majors in the humanities, will I eventually be able to find a job in a Japanese company? I heard masters tend to be more research focused in Japan, so majoring in something unrelated to my Bachelor would be hard I guess.
4) Any piece of advice is welcome!
That’s all, thank you!
by SchedulePlenty702