Japan's transformation to a university that emphasizes graduation rather than entrance exams

With the introduction of online classes, Japanese universities will be given more weight to graduate than entrance exams. Noriyuki Yanagawa, a professor at the University of Tokyo, who was also a member of the Higher Education Working Group of the Educational Rehabilitation Committee, took the stage at the online symposium of the DiTT Association in Japan on October 20. He gave a lecture on the theme of structural transformation of education. Professor Yanagikawa suggested that online classes should enable people of all ages to study at university when needed. He pointed out that primary and secondary education also needs to be advanced according to the level of understanding of the child.

Professor Yanagikawa, who has also studied in the correspondence course at Keio University's Faculty of Economics, is overly valued for entrance exams as a problem of university education in Japan today, and the influence of parents' income and residential area. He mentioned that he was receiving it and that it was not fully functioning as a place for recurrent education for working adults. On top of that, he emphasized that in order to solve these problems, online lessons that have become widespread in response to the Corona disaster should be effectively utilized. Lectures in large classrooms should be replaced with online lessons, and realistic learning should be specialized for discussions with a small number of people.

Regarding the entrance examination, "Basically, all students should be admitted and the applicants should be allowed to enroll (take) online. Those who have taken credits online to learn and have achieved solid grades there. If you come to the campus, you won't have to play one shot, and you will be able to make a much more appropriate selection. " On top of that, "If you free admission and make graduation strict, the university will guarantee the quality of the students. We will make it more meaningful to graduate from that university than which university to enter. It should be, "he called for the need for drastic reform of university education.

　Furthermore, Professor Yanagikawa emphasized that by enhancing online lessons, it will be possible to support recurrent education in which students relearn what they needed after going out to society. He said that elementary and secondary education should also be able to be learned at a speed according to the level of understanding and progress of each child, using tablets and other devices.