Anyone W/Info Regarding Visiting/Living and Costs/Schools/Cities etc
 

I`ll try to help you out here.

What type of schools? Elementary schools? Middle schools? High schools? Universities? Japanese language schools? I can`t really help until I know which. ^^;

I would personally say Nagoya - which is why we live here. It`s the third largest metropolitan area in Japan, but yet isn`t nearly as crowded and hectic as Tokyo or Osaka... But you still get all the great amenities of living in a big city, right in the middle of Japan. To the east is Tokyo, to the west is Osaka. We have a great public transportation system, plus it`s much much much cheaper to live here.

This more depends on your visa than anything else. If you have the means to get a proper visa, I would say living here would be more "smart". You would be able to rent a proper room, etc, and it would end up being less than a hotel.
If you really only can manage to stay a month or so, hotel and food costs (as you`ll have no kitchen in a hotel - all eating out) will REALLY add up. I would guess that 9 months to a year of living in an apartment would be relatively equal to 5 weeks in a hotel.

Trying to rent an apartment for 4 or 5 weeks would probably be impossible, and even if they let you, you`d still have to cover all the costs of starting new utility accounts, etc plus regular deposits for everything. It isn`t much if you were to spread it out over 9 months or a year, but for one month it would be a complete and total waste.

[quote=Nyororin;11639]I`ll try to help you out here.

What type of schools? Elementary schools? Middle schools? High schools? Universities? Japanese language schools? I can`t really help until I know which. ^^;

Gomen nasai! I am speaking of High Schools, as I might be finishing my senior year there. Also, possibly universities, but really I'd just like to know about HighSchools...

I would personally say Nagoya - which is why we live here. It`s the third largest metropolitan area in Japan, but yet isn`t nearly as crowded and hectic as Tokyo or Osaka... But you still get all the great amenities of living in a big city, right in the middle of Japan. To the east is Tokyo, to the west is Osaka. We have a great public transportation system, plus it`s much much much cheaper to live here.

Nagoya sounds great; exactly what I was going for. I only have a limited time on the computer, and limited free time for research, so thanks for helping out!
>If there's anything else, anything at all, I'm all ears! ^,,,,^

Well, if you`d be an exchange student, it might be difficult to get into a public high school without going through some sort of system.
For a private school, if you can pay for it they`ll pretty much let you in. :p

Either way, if you are expecting credit for that year, you`ll NEED to have a very high level of Japanese. Otherwise, it becomes an uncredited, but excused, year away from school. For universities, if you`re not there to study Japanese, you have to have JLPT 1. For high schools, I believe it is JLPT 2, but I may be mistaken. Either way, you have to be at a high enough level that you can actually complete the school work (in Japanese) in order to receive credit.

Edit: And I forgot - the basic academic standards are VERY HIGH. Expect very very difficult - as in high level university level stuff - at the senior level of Japanese high school. I`m not sure what country you`re from, but a 2nd year middle school student here is studying the same stuff that my friends studied in their senior year of high school in the US.

Closeness? Well, it really depends on where you want to go. It is a big city, so if you`re traveling from one end to the other it might take a while. But if you mean convenience, there is nothing to worry about. There is generally a grocery store and convenience store within a 10 minute walk of any spot in the city. For clothing and household goods (like a big department store) you might need to ride a bike for 15 minutes, or take the train or something.

It really all depends on WHERE you would live in the city. Some places are closer to things than others. :P

Nagoya sounds so much better than the usual Tokyo XD

Any universities in Nagoya or around that area?
and say if you were about JLPT4 level, do they expect you to study the japanese language to get to level 1 or until you are about fluent?

Nagoya has a TON of really good universities. Some of the best in the country are here. :P Nanzai, Meidai, Meijo, etc. (Many many many more, those are just nationally famous ones)

If you are JLPT4, then you won`t be able to get into a university for actual studies. You HAVE to have the JLPT1 to do that. If you are just going to do a program to study Japanese (not "real" university) then you can do it from whatever level you have - but you won`t be getting points to put toward a degree... However, most of the places that offer Japanese courses like that will get you to JLPT1 within a year, and you can then enroll normally.

nyaa perfect :vsign:

out of curiosity and to clarify, youre leaving on your own for your senior year in hs?

good luck i guess.......

You know some of my students when they leave their local middle school will ride their bike for one to two hours through the rain or frigid cold to get to high school at 8 am. Then after you finish school, clean the building and do your sports or art club, they all go to cram school where they study more until about 9 or 10 and ride home to do their homework. Right now, the kids are supposedly out for winter holiday but a lot are at school right now doing club activities all day. Running outside in thirty degree weather and practicing their instruments for four to five hours a day, and the senior students are all studying for their high school entrance exams twenty-four seven. This the dedication you will need. Year round, twenty-four seven, school is your life until after high school.

Finish school in the US or where ever you may be. The school system here is not something any human being should suffer through. Saying it's tough doesn't even begin to describe it.

I will say this I am a graduate of a US school and even with how hard the schooling would be I wish I had been able to attend a school like the japanese schools. The teachers I had were usually not good at teaching and would only teach one method. If the students did not understand they would say oh well you need to study more and then they would leave it. I started ditching high school after the high school I was attending was forced to close and half of us were put into our rival school mid-year. I couldn't understand the class work and the teachers did not really care because instead of 30 students they now had 40-45 per class.

It took me a while but when we moved I finally started attending school again... that was after I was finally allowed into the nearest high school, (they did not want me) my mother threatened to call the school board if they did not allow me to attend. All of my classes had 30-35 students to 1 teacher. I started also going to night school. Due to family stuff I had to move around the end of my junior year of high school.

The high school I was attending did not give us correct information on how to transfer students who also attend night school. The councilor basically told us I would be moved out and all my grades transferred as well including night school grades. Wrong!! Apparently the Night School had to transfer my Night School Grades to my High School before I was transferred out of my High School and then everything would be transferred to the New High School. I had been working my butt off for a year and had mostly all A+ grades with one A- grade.

All of it was down the toilet and could not be recovered even though it was lost through no fault of my own. The only grades I had were the High School grades A's and B's. At the next school I got to repeat a year but the teachers were no better. They would give us the test questions and answers a week before the test and read a lil and that was the course work. I graduated as quickly as possible. Oh as well the school councilors give you a weekend with no help to decide what you want to do in college, and then when you turn in the application a hurried 15 min's discussion, that is interrupted, on your choice if you have one.

Because I did not know what I wanted to do besides something with art, like being an illustrator, I decided not to go into college right away because I did not want to get into debt possibly not have a steady job after school. Then I never seemed to be able to save enough money and thought after my high school difficulties that I would not be able to get into a college with a grant/ loan.

Maybe its wrong but I think this wouldn't happen or would be less likely to happen over in Japan because they take their studying so much more seriously. Anyone think differently? If so please explain...

Btw maybe you could say this was just my experience but a lot of people I know complain about the same stuff and or similiar things happening to them. Usually due to school systems being different such as in Alaska you either graduate or do not graduate but in Nevada you have to have so many credits to qualify for being a sophomore, junior etc. and having different classes available or not available.

Well, that can and does happen in Japan too, perhaps even more so than the US. In Japan teachers tend to stick to the textbook and teach to the test. There's not usually a lot of innovative new teaching techniques or different ways of teaching to get to different kinds of students. If you learn it and do well on the test, you go to an academic school and eventually a university. If not, you are put in a vocational school with little hope of university... you are taught a trade like auto mechanic or farmer and that's what you'll be in life because you didn't do well on a test as a kid...