Fighting for Students, Japan’s Colleges Start to Learn Marketing

When Takahiko Someya first became admissions officer at Tokyo’s private Toyo University, the position was about as demanding as the proverbial Maytag repairman’s job. Applications poured in, high schools begged him to take their graduates, and selecting an incoming class was a simple case of comparing test scores. His ample free time was filled with golf, tennis, diving and hang gliding.

A decade later, Someya is up at 5 a.m., often works until midnight and visits dozens of parent-teacher meetings and more than 400 high schools and cram schools each year.

“Things are very tough out there,” he said. “I rarely find time to relax even on Sundays.”

Someya isn’t alone. After decades of relative ease, Japan’s private universities are finding themselves in a pitched battle for survival amid declining subsidies, downward tuition pressure and demographics that are reducing the pool of applicants. By some estimates, 200 of Japan’s 497 technical, two- and four-year private colleges could fold by 2005.

The competition is spurring creativity. Marketing is suddenly on the radar screen. Some institutions are offering a free computer to each student, as well as complimentary taxi service, tuition discounts, friendship trinkets and cutesy branding. Others use bus ads, overnight “open campus” tryouts, slick videos, Christmas cards and recruitment cruises. Kure University is using Space Battleship Yamato animation characters. Hiroshima Women’s University hands out pink date books.

“Our brochures are now brighter, use better paper, have more photos and use cartoon characters,” Someya said. “Many high school students are so used to reading comic books and have problems with more difficult reading.”

Most striking to some is the stark change in attitude at once-arrogant universities. “Even high-and-mighty professors come begging for students now,” said Fumio Kawamura, a teacher at Tokyo Industrial High School. “In the past, even visiting would have been unthinkable.”

Competition almost certainly will get tougher. The number of 18-year-olds in Japan has declined 25% since 1992 to 1.5 million, and is expected to fall an additional 20% before leveling off around 2009, according to the Education Ministry. Even so, an average of 10 new institutions have opened each year in the last decade.

The government is upping the ante by cutting subsidies--which on average constitute 12% of a private university’s operating budget--when enrollment dips below 50% of capacity. It also has threatened to channel a disproportionate share of its support to 30 top public and private schools, squeezing the laggards.

As private universities struggle, public relations and marketing budgets balloon. Location now matters: As city schools tout their links with major companies, outlying schools try to move into the city, and rural institutions suffer.

“Every other private university in the same area is now a rival,” said Kazuyuki Kitamura, director of the Research Institute for Independent Higher Education.

Schools are racing to upgrade, as two-year colleges try to become four-year colleges, which in turn seek to become full-fledged universities. Institutions allow online applications, offer admission tests at more convenient sites and place emphasis on interviews, essays and club memberships over test scores.

As the pool of applicants declines, schools are looking to older, part-time and foreign students. Faced with bankruptcy, Sakata Junior College recruited Chinese students--only to come under scrutiny when many were reported skipping classes to work illegally in Tokyo.

Big names also are being called on to lure applicants. Takushoku University created a stir when it invited former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori as a guest lecturer. Waseda University has hired former South Korean President Kim Young Sam to lecture on international politics, while Hakodate University is offering up comedian Sanshi Katsura for a “business of laughter” course.

“The student is king, and we need to do whatever fun and amusing things it takes to meet their needs,” said Hakushi Kawamura, chief of Teikyo University. “We’re becoming a lot like convenience stores.”

Finding money is a constant headache, particularly for mid- and lower-tier schools. Raising fees is difficult given deflation, a prolonged recession and already high tuition. Competition has prompted some institutions to cut charges by 10% or more. On average, Japanese students pay $9,800 a year at private schools and $6,000 at public institutions, excluding room and board.

The hard times have forced many to outsource recruiting, accounting and guard duties, hire more part-time professors, introduce early retirement and cut back on tenure. And some institutions have opened side businesses, including driving schools, wedding halls, hotels, employment agencies and real estate brokerages.

Overriding the change is concern in Japan that its education system is out of step as it churns out students who are often more suited to old assembly-line jobs than future creative design positions. Japan’s higher education system was deemed the least competitive of 49 nations in a 2001 survey by Switzerland’s International Institute for Management Development.

“The loss of competitiveness in higher education is one of Japan’s most serious problems,” said Yoshimasa Nishimura, a management professor at Tokyo’s Waseda University. “We’ve waited much too long to deal with this problem.”

The nation’s pride has been hurt by large numbers of Japanese going to U.S. universities for advanced degrees--with relatively few students heading the other way. Many Japanese end up staying in U.S. labs, raising fears of a brain drain.

In addition, many of the traits arguably needed to spur creativity--a willingness to question authority and challenge mediocrity--are seen as a threat to Japan’s social fabric and emphasis on group harmony.

“Japan’s a country that thinks equality and fairness is central, which helped our development,” said Akira Ishikawa, director general of the Education Ministry. “Now we need to change this for the next stage.”

Many are resisting that change. Tradition-bound institutions still give relatively little power to university presidents and enormous clout to professors, who are cited in surveys by 30% of schools as major roadblocks to reform.

Others worry that higher education is being degraded by pandering to student tastes. “I doubt over the long run this will succeed in attracting students,” said Satoshi Ajisaka of Obunsha Group’s Education Information Division, a consultancy.

Although consolidation has been slow, a government survey found that even nearly 40% of public universities were considering mergers.

Saitama University alumnus Atsushi Chikamatsu, a 28-year-old employee at Tokyo Electric Power, is saddened by the idea that his alma mater’s identity could be undermined by a proposed merger with Gunma University. But others are taking it all in stride.

“My company was merged and renamed, and my city recently merged and disappeared as well,” said Saitama alumnus Katsuhisa Naito, a 60-year-old retiree. “I guess it can’t be helped.”

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Rie Sasaki of The Times’ Tokyo Bureau contributed to this report.