Level of Japanese for Undergraduate Schools in Japan?
I'm a 10th grader in high school and i was wondering if in 2 and a half years if i could learn enough Japanese to be able to go to a University in Japan (undergraduate) or do i have to be completely fluent before i can even join any University in japan? -I'm using Rosetta Stone to try and learn Japanese.
Japan - 6 Answers
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1 :
JLPT Level 1 (which is not easy!) used to be the standard for university, but there is new integrated university entrance exam for prospective foreign students that covers both Japanese language ability and typical university entrance exam subjects. The advantage of the new exam is that a foreign student can use the results to apply to any university in Japan without writing a given uni's own exam, a la the SAT. AFAIK the level of Japanese language for the new exam is about the same as JLPT1. That being said, you could attend Temple Japan or IUJ without any Japanese language ability whatsoever, or attend a Japanese language school on a pre-college visa. There are also Japanese unis that have their own programs specifically for learners of Japanese. However if you want to do undergrad work in Japanese you obviously need excellent Japanese language ability. The irony is that at the grad level in say..math or science, you might not need much Japanese ability since English is a lingua franca. Obviously, physics post-docs at Tsukuba U. are not chosen for their Japanese abililty. Therefore I don't think Rosetta Stone is going to make you capable enough to do undergrad work in Japan, but don't give it up.
2 :
If you first go to a university in your home country which has ties to a university in Japan, then you could go to Japan for a year or two as an exchange student. Technically you would be enrolled in your home university and earning credits there, but you'd still get to live in Japan and take classes at a Japanese university (some in Japanese, some in English, and also some special Japanese language classes for exchange students). You need some Japanese for these programs but the required level is much lower than for enrolling in a Japanese university program. If you study hard using Rosetta Stone and also take 2 years of university-level Japanese classes in your home country, I think you'd be able to do the exchange. To actually enroll at a Japanese university as a full time student, I think you'd need a minimum of 7 years of college level Japanese study, and that's assuming you're studying Japanese full time. If it's more like a hobby, you'd need 10 years or more. Most of the foreigners who enroll in Japanese universities as full time students are people who have been raised bilingual or learning Japanese from a young age.
3 :
Your Answer: Don`t give up - what the other guys say about rosetta stone is true to a point, its like learning english only from watching sesame street. But don`t despair, there are a whole heap of international universitys in Japan and many others that have entire courses in English but you will get the degree from that University. These are true especially with anything from Law, Business, Hospitality, Languages, History and Culture. A tip is to go for the Japanese Monbusho - It`s a Japanese government scholarship. An informative website is http://www.studyjapan.go.jp/en/toj/toj03... It`s difficult to get but well worth it, they give you a degree! Or if that fails, check in with your university in your home nation and see if they have exchange programs or better yet - cross-institutional links with Japanese universitys ie. study there for up to half of your degree and get credit. Good luck with it and have a great time if you do get to go.
4 :
It's easier to do graduate work in Japan because you'll already have a degree and hopefully someone at home will recommend you for a scholarship in Japan. The more Japanese you know, the better, but it's not much of a problem, because study is study. You just use what resources you can. An undergrad degree in Japan would be difficult. Even a lot of Japanese find it quite difficult to get into university. They have very difficult entrance exams. I don't know details for people like you because I haven't heard of too many foreign undergrads in Japanese universities, although I have met a couple. University is also quite expensive in Japan. Probably what you'd have to do is ace high school, learn as much Japanese as possible (including reading and writing), find out where you want to study, what you want to study, and the entrance requirements for that school. You've got a lot of research and study ahead of you, at least twice as much as any of your classmates, for a couple years at least. I think you've got some personal work to do too, digging deep at what you actually want to achieve out of this.
5 :
Depending on which program you join, you need or not need to speak Japanese before you arrive to Japan. For example if you join the Monbusho undergrad program, in your first year you will go to an intensive language course, and will join the university from the second year. Good luck!
6 :
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