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Report on lousy schools in Japan spurs debate on who’s to blame

A report last week from the Japanese Ministry of Education about the sorry state of some low-ranked universities, lovingly called “F-rank,” sent ripples through the country and reignited a debate about how to properly prepare students for “life in the real world.” While the Japanese government’s announcement sparked renewed interest in higher education reform, these low-level schools (and their terrible textbooks) have been the butt of jokes on the Internet for years. F-rank universities are notorious for their extremely lax entrance requirements, high student-to-teacher ratio and producing graduates who simply aren’t ready to enter the real world and join a company. Education advocates and people tired of dealing with incompetent co-workers all wanted to share their ideas about how to change the system to avoid a generation of poorly trained workers.

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Unusual punishment lands Hiroshima elementary school teacher in hot water

A male teacher from a public school in Hiroshima City is in trouble for the implementation of a bizarre, and disputably inappropriate, classroom rule involving making his students pose and have their picture taken in front of the entire class. 

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