JAPAN: University mulls change to academic calendar

Discussion on starting in the autumn and graduating Japanese students in the late spring or autumn has been around since the 1980s, but the debate has moved up a gear with news that the University of Tokyo, known as Todai, is mulling the move. An internal panel is expected to report by the end of the year, reports David McNeill for The Chronicle of Higher Education.

The current spring start puts the nation's universities out of sync with most of the planet, hugely complicating exchanges, the hiring of foreign faculty and the recruiting of overseas students. Fewer than 3% of students at the University of Tokyo are from abroad, a long way behind top Western colleges. Increasing that percentage requires bringing the academic calendar into line with elsewhere, says Masako Egawa, an executive vice president at the university.
Full report on The Chronicle site