Hello, everyone.
My niece has two years left to finish high school and she wants to come over to Japan after her graduation to study for a degree. She’s Turkish and an objectively mediocre student.
Honestly, any university is fine. I’ll sponsor her so finances aren’t a problem. I’m assuming SAT and JLPT certificates are a must but are there other tips or tricks that would be vital to her acceptance?
Anyone with experience?
2 comments
If she’s applying for programs in English, check universities that offer degrees in English and look at their application guidelines. [Here’s ICU’s admission guideline as an example](https://www.icu.ac.jp/en/admissions/undergraduate/docs/UndergraduateAdmissionsGuide2023.pdf) (pdf). Requirements are different depending on the university. There is no “common application” type process for these types of English-based programs in Japanese Universities (as far as I know), so she will need to prepare documents for each one.
Many things need preparation from months in advance, so tell her to look at the guidelines of different universities and see what she needs to do/prepare. For example, a lot of universities require applicants who haven’t received their last x years of education at school in English to take IELTS or TOEFL. Excerpt from the ICU admission guideline
>IELTS/TOEFL is optional if you…
>
>- Have spent both junior and senior high school years – i.e. the last continuous six school years – at institutions in which English is the language of instruction in all classes except for foreign and national language classes.
>
>- Are an IB Diploma candidate and are taking or have taken IB English A (“Literature” or “Language and Literature”).
I did PhD here. Bachelor and Master degree is waste of time/money unless one can get to top ranked universities. Even then it still questionable – education culture here is not aimed at one’s development of thinking or skill application…After my experience here, if I meet any graduate from Tokyo Daigaku and etc, I am not impressed.
I think it all depends on major,though, what she wants to study. I came here because of biomedical research in stem cells, for example. I could get access to better facilities and research projects than in my home country.
To simplify it, if my options were any good uni in the West (western EU, US, Canada, Australia) or Japan, I would not choose Japan. However, if it was about my home country vs Japan, I would choose Japan again.
If her sole purpose of studying in Japan is just to live in Japan, that’s a waste of money.
Overall, Japanese universities are overrated. Currently, they also do not provide thriving environment for development and thinking ( I mean learning how to think, apply your knowledge).
Most important thing – I would double check if their offered English program is really in English. This is one of the biggest scams on this country -many times professors themselves can speak English, barely any classes or subjects in English, most people don’t even speak English at universities.
Nevertheless, I do not regret. Take my post with a grain of salt as everything depends on circumstances. I would definitely stick to top national universities here (Tokyo Uni, Kyoto Uni, Tohoku Uni, Osaka Uni) or maybe a few private ones (Waseda?) as anything else makes no sense later in future.