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School Daze By HANNAH BEECH

Kobe is the kind of Japanese city where a yellow light still means slow down rather than

speed up. The days are calm and ordered in the old-fashioned way, with parents rushing

to work in the morning and uniformed kids dawdling on the way to school. It was here

that a quiet junior high school boy grew up on comic books and dreams of becoming a

superhero. He was a loner, picked on at school by both teachers and students, a trial

shared by countless children before him. Nobody thought it alarming; if anything, in the

Japanese context, it was considered character-building, along with cramming for difficult

exams or wearing shorts through the coldest of winters during elementary years. This was

normal school life.

But one day, that calm continuum was broken. The 14-year-old boy was suspended from

school for fighting. To pass the days away from classes, he tortured cats and collected

hunting knives. One long, idle afternoon, he invited a younger schoolmate out for some

fun, luring the 11-year-old to a quiet hill where he strangled him and sawed off his head.

The 14-year-old placed the severed head in a plastic bag and dropped it off at the gate of

his school. A note stuffed in the younger boy's mouth read, "(This is) revenge against the

compulsory education system and the society that created it."

So began the deluge. In 1999, two years after the Kobe incident, a teenager stabbed and

killed a seven-year-old boy on a school playground. A year after that, a 17-year-old boy

who had endured taunts at school began bashing passersby with a baseball bat on one of

Tokyo's busiest streets. Then it was the turn of other Asian countries. Last October in

South Korea, where some child insurance policies now cover school violence, a 16-year-

old boy surnamed Kim walked into his social studies class and fatally stabbed a boy who

had picked on him. The same month in Hong Kong, seven-year-old Ng Dik-wai failed an

exam in Chinese dictation, went home and leaped out of his high-rise apartment—earning

him a place as among Asia's youngest education victims.

The East Asian economic miracle was built on a number of sturdy pillars: hard work,

high savings rates and Confucian values—in particular, an almost fanatical belief in the

value of education. And for years, Asia could rest easy in the know-ledge that its school

systems were producing the best and the brightest. Rising GDPs were proof, so were the

calculus prodigies and engineers churned out by the millions. East Asian students almost

always scored higher in international math and science tests—across the board, country

by country—than their counterparts in the West. All you had to do was walk into an

Asian classroom to see what they were doing right. Students were diligent, quiet,

involved in copying down the daily lessons. It was nothing like the chaos of, say,

American schools with the spitballs and pierced eyebrows and the emphasis on attitude

with-a-capital-A. Education experts enjoined America's teachers to look East.

The contrast isn't so stark anymore. Recent math and science test scores show U.S.

students gaining ground on their counterparts in Asia. And with their rote-based curricula

and examcentric systems, Asians are finding that even children who attend the very best

public schools lack the creative skills to compete in a new, challenging information

economy. Who can name more than a handful of famous East Asian scientists or

mathematicians—if that many? And now, some of the ailments of the West have come

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East. The dropout phenomenon, once considered exclusively Western, has reached Asian

shores: in 1999, a record 130,000 Japanese primary and junior high school students

refused to attend school for more than a month. The trendiest neighborhoods in Tokyo,

Seoul and Taipei are filled with disaffected kids playing hooky, their ennui relieved by

designer drugs and designer shopping.

Most alarming is the towering degree of unhappiness among Asian kids. Schools are

suddenly plagued with record levels of violent crime and sky-high suicide rates. In Hong

Kong, one in three teens have had suicidal thoughts, up 28% from two years ago. The

number of teenagers between the ages of 15 and 19 in Thailand who commit suicide is

second only to adult workers. Those children may be on the extreme edge, but some of

the kids in the front rows are almost as unhappy and frustrated. "Something has gone

very wrong with our schools," says Hiroshi Yoshimoto, a director in the education reform

division of Japan's Education Ministry. "We all know we have to reform—yesterday."

The good news is that things are changing. Governments are figuring it out after decades

of white papers and bureaucratic backsliding. Parents, too: as countless moms and dads

get laid off from jobs they thought they had for life, adults are realizing there's little

reason for kids to endure Asia's stifling schools if there's no promise of success upon

graduation. Thus new schools are offering refuge to kids sick of rote learning and eager

for some real education. "We would like to teach kids the method of acquiring

knowledge, rather than just facts," says Lee Ki Woo, a Seoul education official, who is

helping oversee South Korea's education reforms. But the big question remains: Are

Asia's classrooms changing enough to bring the continent back to competitive levels with

the West? "The existing education system has produced reliable managers for predictable

times," says Tharman Shanmugaratnam, Singapore's Senior Minister of State for

Education. "But it now needs to produce a new breed of leaders who have a certain

ruggedness, an ability to respond quickly to situations."

Three Aprils ago, on a breezy spring morning, six-year-old Marino Kajikawa joined the

neat lines of sailor-suited kids marching to their first day of school in Koshigaya, a

middle-class enclave on the outskirts of Tokyo. During the welcoming assembly, the

principal spoke of harmony, friendliness, togetherness. But those platitudes were

forgotten by recess, when a posse of older kids began picking on Marino for looking a

little too inquisitively at their circle of activity. Tearful, Marino came home and

announced she hated school and wanted to quit. Her parents scoffed. But after just eight

days, Marino woke up with severe stomach cramps. The next day, she had a bad

headache. Then it was a fever, concocted by sticking the thermometer against a lightbulb.

"Even though I was very little," says Marino, now nine years old, "I was sure I would

never go back to school again." Her parents didn't realize it at the time—but Marino was

to become a first-grade dropout.

Japan has attracted the most attention for the failings in its schools, but its problems are

mirrored throughout the region. That's no accident: Japan was so successful economically

that other countries emulated its education system. The main goal of East Asian schools:

to churn out literate, disciplined workers for factories and offices. The secondary goal: by

pushing students through a tapering hierarchy of schools—poor, better, best—the

country's finest test-takers are decanted into the best jobs in government ministries and

top corporations.

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Stated so simply, that sounds like a meritocracy, but the reality is very different. What it

means to most East Asian kids is a childhood of "examination hell." From the day their

offspring set foot in kindergarten, the goal of most parents is to get their children into one

of the good public high schools. The better the high school, the higher the chance of

getting into a good university. The pressure intensifies in high school, which becomes

one long cram session for college admission. In many countries, if a student wants to

hedge his bets and apply to, say, four universities, he has to study that many times over:

each school has its own exam.

That's a whole lot of studying: in school, at home into the wee hours and at private cram

schools that are major industries throughout East Asia. Even worse are the social

implications of failure. The tiny minority who make it into good universities are,

theoretically, the winners. Everyone else is a loser. "Our education system," says Wang

Jenn-wu, a former member of Taiwan's Cabinet-level education reform committee, "was

so focused on the country's economic success that it ignored individual success."

It has been this way for centuries, in imperial China, Heian Japan, Ayuthaya-era

Thailand: teachers instruct, students cram, and success or failure is the difference

between a life at court (or at Sony or the Bank of China) or a life in the fields (or hawking

cell phones on sidewalks). Social skills become irrelevant: in Asian school hallways, the

pecking order comes straight from grade scores. Kids who don't fall in that rigid line are

considered outsiders: if they don't care, say, or if they screw up, if they prefer sports. Or

even if they're a little too pretty. Seira Kawashima, 14, looks like a Japanese animE

heroine: she has wide eyes, flushed cheeks and a perfect smudge of a mouth. When she

walks through the shopping arcades of Koshigaya, boys pay attention and people tell her

she ought to be a model. At school, her beauty elicited stares too, but of a less positive

kind. "If you're ugly or pretty or somehow different, it makes you a target," Seira says.

"In school, the most important lesson I learned was that you have to melt in." But Seira

couldn't; even getting braces didn't help. Unable to cope, the prettiest girl in class became

a dropout.

After leaving public school, Seira found she still wanted to learn. She enrolled in Apple

Tree, an experimental academy in Saitama prefecture, where children come when they

please and study only what they want. It doesn't look like a dropout's place: the kids don't

have attitudes or drug problems or rap sheets. There's not a nose ring in sight. When a

visitor walks in, all the kids look up, then bob their heads in a show of respect.

Yusuke Masuda, 19, is a baseball stud who was the star shortstop of his little-league

team. Even though he was popular at school, Yusuke felt stifled by the crowded

classrooms, authoritarian teachers and emphasis on uniformity. Like the others here, he

faked illness to get out of school and never went back. Now, he helps tutor the younger

students at Apple Tree, sitting next to them on tatami mats as they go over their math

lessons. "The biggest condemnation of the Japanese education system," says Yoshie

Masuda, Apple Tree's founder, "is that even normal kids can't handle school anymore."

Apple Tree is part of a 30-member, experimental-education consortium that received

Japanese government approval last year. Before that, young kids who dropped out of

traditional schools could attend alternative academies—but they were not allowed to

apply to public high schools unless the principal gave his personal consent. (Translation:

hope you like working at a 7-Eleven the rest of your life.) Now, with so many kids

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eschewing the system altogether, Japan's Education Ministry has realized it has to

embrace other forms of schooling. "There are many ways to teach children," admits

Yoshimoto, the Education Ministry bureaucrat. "We must look at all methods to address

the needs of our students."

This April, Japan will complete a radical restructuring, abolishing Saturday classes,

encouraging volunteerism and allowing schools to experiment with different curriculae.

Later this year, Taiwan will scrap its university entrance exam system in favor of a more

holistic approach that considers grades, essays and extracurricular activities. In South

Korea, up to a third of incoming college students will be picked not for their test scores

but for their unique talents.

The real revolution, though, is coming from the region's parents and kids. Some parents

are allowing their children to escape the system altogether, either by dropping out or

going to school abroad. Others are turning to that budding crop of alternative schools like

Apple Tree, where creativity and camaraderie can flourish. At the Beijing 21st Century

Experimental School, 1,400 kids from all over China receive bilingual education and

loads of computer training. Even though private schooling is a fledgling phenomenon in

China, 21st Century has already sent its top students to Elite institutions like Peking and

Qinghua universities. "My old school was supposed to be good, but it didn't really teach

me anything about computers or English," says Ni Chengcheng, a 13-year-old, straight-A

student. "I know that what I learn here will be useful for my future."

Perhaps the biggest problem with Asia's schools today is that children themselves no

longer link substantive learning with schooling. "I look for a spark in kids' eyes," says a

Hong Kong therapist who deals with 10 young stress cases a week. "But more and more,

I just don't see any interest in what they're being taught." Surveys show that while East

Asian pupils top worldwide academic tests, they retain the information for the least

amount of time, believing, not surprisingly, there is little utility in what they learn in the

classroom. And employers are taking note. According to Alexa Chow, managing director

of Centaline Julies Personnel Consultants in Hong Kong, graduates of Asian schools are

finding themselves beaten out for positions with multinational corporations by peers who

were educated abroad. "Those educated overseas," says Chow, "are more independent,

more aggressive and more proactive when tackling problems." A poll of 20-plus

countries by the Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement discovered

that Asian students scored second-lowest in enjoyment of math and science, even though

they placed first in understanding of these subjects. No wonder, then, that so few Asians

are drawn to research when they graduate—they want nothing to do with stuffy labs that

stifle creativity as their schools did.

The Haja Center, an experimental school located in northwestern Seoul, is trying to put

the fun back into learning. With a million-dollar grant from the city government last year,

the school has created a laid-back oasis in a country where a popular saying goes, "Sleep

four hours and pass, sleep five hours and fail." At the Haja Center, students lounge on

mats or hang out in a funky playground. (In most Seoul schools, playgrounds are empty

because students don't have time to play; 86% of kindergartners receive cram school

lessons). Cafeteria speakers pump out dance music, and the school boasts facilities for

filmmaking, Web design and even a recording studio. Teachers are called tutors, and kids

use nicknames—like Oasis, Lithium, Gum and Chili—in order to avoid Korea's

hierarchical honorifics. "It's a way to get rid of old labels and instill new ways of

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thinking," says Cho Han Haejoang, a Yonsei University sociology professor who set up

the school three years ago. "The idea is to create a new self."

That's exactly what the Haja Center has given Lee So Dam. The shy 13-year-old spends

her days drawing intricately etched faces. She wants to become an artist, and she dropped

out of public school because her art teacher only wanted her to precisely render white

plaster statues. "In public schools, kids are told how they must draw," says Japanese

alternative-art teacher Hiroko Miura, as she watches one of her students throw great

splotches of color onto a drawing pad. "But if you don't allow creativity in art, how are

you ever going to find the next Van Gogh?"

The Pathumkongkah technical high School in a festering part of Bangkok exemplifies

much of what has gone wrong with Asia's schools. Murals on the walls depict the modern

social problems facing its 2,400 students: AIDs, drugs, prostitution and violence. In the

eight monsoon-stained buildings, individual teachers have to preside over classes of more

than 50 students. Class size continues to increase by 5% each year; there is a teacher

hiring freeze. When asked to describe the good aspects of education, Pathumkongkah's

deputy headmaster, Pethai Aowayatitaw, arches an eyebrow, giggles nervously and says,

"Here? In Thailand?"

When Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra swept into office last year, he promised to

overhaul the nation's blighted schools. Although literacy is high in Thailand, and in

Southeast Asia the country ranks second to Malaysia on the percentage of GDP it spends

on education, Thailand's students lag behind in skills needed to transform a factory-based

economy into a knowledge-based one. "Students can't really read or write," says

Sippanondha Ketudat, a former Minister of Education. "All they know how to do is tick a

box next to a multiple-choice question." But despite his promises, Thaksin has done little

to goose a bloated Education Ministry. The country has had three education ministers in

less than a year—including Thaksin himself—and the current one is advocating more rote

memorization and the reintroduction of caning as a disciplinary measure.

Some parents are so fed up they're pulling their kids out of Asian schools altogether.

Clark Cui grew up in the Chinese boomtown of Shenzhen but he now shares a suburban

three-bedroom brick house in Sydney with three other high school kids from China. The

number of Chinese students studying abroad has skyrocketed: China ranked fifth among

countries sending students to Australia in 2000. This year, it will have the No. 1 slot. "My

parents didn't want me to go through China's entrance exam hell," says Clark, who hopes

to major in software engineering at an Australian university. "And I like studying in a

place where I can make jokes with my teachers and breathe clean air."

Most parents, of course, can't afford that escape route. Still, there are local alternatives. In

Taiwan, the Forest Elementary School offers students a chance to study traditional

subjects and still get a breath of fresh air. Located in a small wood about a 40-minute

drive outside petrol-redolent Taipei, the school encourages kids to explore their inner

mind through hiking, camping and getting to know local fauna. "Kids here," says school

adviser Shih Ying, "have the courage to climb trees, to be different from others and to be

themselves." For one lucky group of East Asian youngsters, the buzz of worker bees are a

part of the natural landscape—not a glimpse of their future lives.

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Comprehension

1. What does the first line of the article imply about Kobe, and how does it do this?

Answer: It implies that Kobe is a rather traditional city that still lives by conservative

rules, and a moderate pace of life. The first line reminds us that in most fast-paced cities,

traffic laws are often broken for the sake of speed as cars rush through the yellow light so

that they will not get stuck behind the red light that will follow.

2. Why do you think the writer give details of the dressing and "cramming" study

style that the children in Kobe undergo?

Answer: He wants to establish that the life of the 14-year-old boy in the article was no

different from that of other children in the city.

3. The writer makes the point that meritocracy often results in "examination hell"

for school children. Why is this so?

Answer: Meritocracy dictates that only those with creditable academic results,

determined by performance in examinations, will be admitted to reputable institutions of

higher education. Parents put pressure on children to do their best in various university

entrance examinations, resulting in non-stop, stressful studying, rather than focussing on

intellectual development.

Developing Your Skills for the AQ

Article 26. (1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free,

at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education

shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made

generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all

on the basis of merit. (2) Education shall be directed to the full

development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect

for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote

understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or

religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for

the maintenance of peace. (3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind

of education that shall be given to their children.

Few countries, if any, practice all the rights to the full extent as worded in the Universal

Declaration. Consider the rights regarding education in the box above. To what extent

does your country practice the rights to education? Should your country practice these

particular rights to a greater or smaller extent, and why?

TIP: Students should consider the implication of each section of the article and how its

implementation would affect the country socially, economically and culturally.