Attending Japanese School: 16 Unique Facts You Didn’t Know

“Have you ever been curious about the daily life of a Japanese student?”

In Japan, it is mandatory to go to elementary for 6 years and junior high school for 3 years until children until the age 15 years old. After that, more than 98.8% of children study in high school for 3 years until they reach 18 years old. 58.1% of graduates go to universities and 23.8% of them enter vocational schools.

Although there are similarities with Japanese schools and western schools such as with uniforms and grades, there are also several aspects of Japanese schools that may be surprising to many visitors to the country. With its own educational system, Japan has independently molded its youth into the harmonious society it is today.

1. “Randoseru” — Japanese Backpack

In Japanese primary school, 99% of students use a knapsack called “randoseru.” In the past, boys used only black ones and girls used only red ones, and if someone used different colours they tend to be bullied. However, nowadays there are more colour varieties such as pink, blue, purple, brown, green, yellow, etc…

The history of randoseru stems from the fact that bakufu provided knapsacks called ransel, originally from the Netherlands military, towards the end of the Edo era. The emergence of popularity of the randosel was during Taisyo era when the Japanese prime minister presented this bag to the Taisyo emperor when he started primary school.