Photo/Illutration Students protest a planned tuition hike during the University of Tokyo’s festival at its Hongo campus in Bunkyo Ward on May 19, 2024. (Fumio Masutani)

The University of Tokyo, Japan’s most prestigious university, will offer a 25-percent tuition reduction for students of low-income parents who reside outside the greater Tokyo metropolitan area.

The discount will apply to eligible students enrolling in April, the university, often called Todai, said Jan. 17.

Students must meet six requirements, including belonging to households with annual incomes not exceeding 9 million yen ($57,800) and living in prefectures other than Tokyo, Kanagawa, Chiba, and Saitama.

They also must enter undergraduate courses at Todai within two years of their graduation from high school.

The decision came as the university will raise annual tuition by 20 percent from the current level to 642,960 yen, beginning with those joining the school in spring this year.

But students from remote areas who meet the prerequisites will pay 482,220 yen—more than 50,000 yen less than the current fee of 535,800 yen--under the envisioned system.

The discount program is separate from the government’s education subsidy.

And in another program to help young people in need, the University of Tokyo currently exempts students from families earning 4 million yen or less from tuition fees.

Todai will widen the exemption program to include students from households with annual incomes of 6 million yen or less. This will start in spring, coinciding with the planned fee hike.

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Masayuki Kobayashi, a specially appointed professor of pedagogy at J.F. Oberlin University, described the University of Tokyo’s new tuition discount policy as “rare.”

“Prestigious colleges and universities, like Waseda University, often extend financial support to enrollees from distant areas via scholarship mechanisms, rather than tuition discounts,” Kobayashi said.

Well-versed in economic assistance programs for students, Kobayashi acknowledged the significance of the tuition reduction.

But he stressed that expanding scholarship programs would be better, given that students from faraway areas must bear a heavy burden beyond education, such as boarding costs and living expenses.

According to sources, the University of Tokyo is “struggling to secure diversity,” as more enrollees come from combined junior and senior high schools in the Tokyo metropolitan area.

However, Kobayashi noted: “Since those from Tokyo and the three other prefectures are excluded, some students may feel dissatisfied with the discount.”

The University of Tokyo has refrained from clarifying why the tuition reduction will be limited to people from outside the metropolitan area.

“The operator should provide a detailed explanation of the objective, as it is seemingly seeking to attract more students from remote areas amid the drop in the number of such enrollees,” Kobayashi said.

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