Hello!
Recently got accepted to ICU in Tokyo, I’m very excited because it’s pretty much my dream school! From the research I’ve done, there’s not a lot of info I can find online about campus life and the school doesn’t really have any updated videos/social media promotion. I just had a couple of things I was curious about that I couldn’t find anything on (in English). For reference, I’m Japanese-American but have elementary-level Japanese language skills.
Questions:
* Is it normal for students to join multiple clubs/circles? For example, I currently do multiple sports, social justice clubs, and music/theatre clubs but it seems like most Japanese students only commit to one or two.
* How competitive are the scholarships offered by the school and the government? A lot of the government scholarships require the university to apply on your behalf so I haven’t been able to find anything about requirements or competitiveness.
* Are rent/food estimates for suburban Tokyo pretty accurate? Or should I be expecting to spend more/less than what I can find online? I can shop and cook for myself, I mostly eat out as a social thing. Rent is the biggest thing I’m worried about since dorm capacity at ICU is really limited.
Thank you!
5 comments
>Is it normal for students to join multiple clubs/circles? … it seems like most Japanese students only commit to one or two.
Japanese students only commit to one or two because “Club” has a ***wildly*** different meaning in Japan, especially when compared to the US.
Club sports in Japan are effectively varsity-level sports teams, with the level of commitment and time consumption that implies.
Even academic/artistic clubs require enough commitment that you quite literally won’t have time for more than one or two.
Circles are much more low-key, basically the equivalent of a “club” in the US. More social than competitive, sometime they’ll just go drinking instead of practicing, stuff like that. But while circles don’t have as much expected time commitment, they’re still time *consuming*, so you probably still won’t have time for more than a few.
>How competitive are the scholarships offered by the school and the government?
Are you a dual citizen? Because the vast majority of scholarships available aren’t open to foreigners. Pretty much the only major scholarship available to foreigners is the ***highly*** competitive MEXT scholarship.
>Are rent/food estimates for suburban Tokyo pretty accurate?
I mean… You haven’t told us where you’re looking, so it’s impossible to say if the numbers you’ve seen are accurate.
Most websites that do cost of living estimates assume a middle-class sort of lifestyle. So unless the site specifically says it’s aimed at students you can safely assume that you can save a few yen by giving up some of the assumed luxuries.
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hey, i applied during the march application period. i was wondering if you would feel comfortable sharing your stats with me?