Japan 2nd lowest among 28 OECD nations in education spending

Wednesday 09th September, 05:21 AM JST

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Patrick Smash at 12:49 PM JST - 9th September

Japan doesn't want better educated people or increased social mobility. It wants those who are already wealthy to remain wealthy, and for their children to be the future. There's no room here for the poor working class kids to better themselves; ones future is largely based on how much money the family has.

This will not change anytime soon as Japan is still basically feudal in this regard. All recent PMs had family members (fathers or grandfathers) who were PMs. It starts at the top, and works its way down.
dolphingirl at 12:53 PM JST - 9th September

I was surprised when I first saw public schools in Japan; so old and drab. Not an environment which stimulates learning. And the quality of education isn't great either. Sure the kids are great at memorizing and spitting out facts and figures but they cannot think for themselves and apply what they've learned to real life situations. I really hope that the government will increase their educational spending. Japan's future depends on it.
timorborder at 01:42 PM JST - 9th September

Lots of good comments here.

Given the national fixation with people's educational background in this country (the name brand value of one's alma mater), by some perverse twist I think the shoddy reality that is much of Japan's public education system actually encourages gifted students (those who memorize and regurgitate facts better than their peers) to try harder. Indeed, the level of expectation among Japanese parents regarding their children getting ahead seems to border on being a national neurosis.
stirfry at 02:08 PM JST - 9th September

a national neurosis.

one of many, to be sure
bgaudry at 03:06 PM JST - 9th September

I work at a private school and we have:

a. Cleaners b. Hot running water. c. projectors and screens in every room

And a whole lot more, my 8 years in he public system didn't even come close.
Yelnats at 04:13 PM JST - 9th September

My three kids have attended Japanese schools. The elementary building is drab, but there is a lot of art on teh walls, and the classrooms are lively, and the best part is that the kids clean the whole building. Money is saved for cleaning. Text books are thin and light, and not fat and heavy and expensive like in the US. The only thing I do not like about the system, is that High School is not a requirement. Public HS is hard to get into. That law should be changed and have every one be told they must go to HS.
Monoflow at 05:36 PM JST - 9th September

Will at least produce a lot of Arbeitos for the Convy Stores...
bcbrownboy at 06:33 PM JST - 9th September

Of course, how many OECD nations don't have public supported High Schools for ALL students?!? A large percentage of students here DON'T GET A FREE HIGH SCHOOL EDUCATION. It is absurd for the 2nd biggest economy on earth to not give FREE HS education. What kind of social system is that!
Disillusioned at 07:13 PM JST - 9th September

The public schools in Japan are nothing short of disgusting! They are filthy dirty, they have very little or no audio/visual equipment or computers, their school libraries consist mainly of previous year's textbooks (if they have a library at all), the senior highs have no food facilities or a designated eating area, most have a few drink machines that are switched off when classes are on and most of the teachers are happy to let the kids watch movies all day and give them the answers to easy tests at the end of the term. And then, they expect the parents to foot most of the bill for it. The government's answer to this is to train the teachers for longer and to reintroduce Saturday schooling. It's a farce!
sydenham at 08:26 PM JST - 9th September

It's a farce!

I guess that's why they still outscore the vast majority of OECD nations on international tests. lol

sounds like a lot of empty whingeing to me.

sure, a lot needs to be changed. more money needs to go into teacher training and the English curriculum is another topic entirely.

But who cares about drink machines being turned off to save power (sounds like a good idea, actually) or lack of cafeteria space, or lack of newly painted walls or what have you!?!

As long as the schools are earthquake-proofed and have good teachers with good support, that's all that really matters.
gonemad at 11:52 PM JST - 9th September

As some posters here have said, Japan is still ranked in the very top when it comes to surveys of education level. The conclusion then should be that the Japanese education system is top in terms of efficiency. Good news for the Japanese taxpayer. Or not...?
Nessie at 12:18 AM JST - 10th September

Japan had the second-smallest expenditure on education in 2006 among the 28 member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in terms of the ratio of such state spending to gross domestic product

Inept Kyodo translators. You could cut a quarter of the words and improve the clarity with...

Japan's education expenditures as a share of gross domestic product in 2006 ranked second lowest among the 28 countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Nessie at 12:22 AM JST - 10th September

while the survey also showed that spending by Japanese households with kindergarteners or college students is much larger than other countries

Larger in gross terms? Larger as a share of...? Japanese writers are truly inept at comparisions.
mnemosyne23 at 03:15 AM JST - 10th September

Being able to memorize facts and figures and then spit them out again on standardized tests is not all there is to education, no matter how the scores rank against international figures. An equally important part of education is the development of critical thinking skills and objective reasoning, which I think most people will agree is missing from the majority of the Japanese education system. Elementary school is for your ABCs and 123s. Middle school/junior high is for your fractions, decimals, and sentence diagramming. High school should be where you go to take the knowledge you've acquired in previous grade levels and turn it into original thought. Anyone can say that the Battle of Hastings was in 1066, but it takes critical analysis to explain WHY it happened and what the effects were, both positive and negative. Outsiders wonder how Japan can have the second largest economy in the world and be a booming mecca for technological innovation, yet still suffer from overt and SOCIALLY ACCEPTABLE sexism, racism and classism, as if it were frozen in the 1950s. I point at the stale Japanese educational system and say, "Behold."

Publically funded, MANDATORY high school should be available for all students. It should practice a rigorous curriculum that encourages critical thinking in addition to standard memorization. If I had my way, the educational system would be overhauled so that cram schools became obsolete, children went to school to LEARN rather than memorize, and future generations grew up trying to make their country even better than it is now, rather than content to maintain the status quo.
Disillusioned at 06:12 AM JST - 10th September

sydenham - As long as the schools are earthquake-proofed and have good teachers with good support, that's all that really matters.

BUT! They are not earthquake proof nor do they have good teachers with support. Also, the students you mentioned doing so well in international tests are the result juku and/or private school - The ramblings of the naive!