Home > Policy > White Paper, Notice, Announcement > White Paper > FY2003 White Paper on Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology >Part1 Reference Higher Education Reform Q&A? Question7-1

Society is changing in diverse ways due to the advancement of science and technology, as well as social, economic and cultural globalization and other developments. As international competition also becomes increasingly intense, there are many problems that we cannot see using only the knowledge and technology, as well as the framework of ideas and ways of thinking, that we have had until now.

In this environment, there is a need to cultivate human resources to have diverse experiences and international viewpoints exceeding what we have had until now, and who possess advanced and specialized job skills.

For this purpose, from FY2003, a new professional graduate school system was initiated that carries out education that is specialized towards cultivating people with advanced and specialized job skills, tailored to the traits of various fields.

It has been pointed out that education emphasizing cultivation of researchers has been developed at graduate schools until now. However, professional graduate schools are structured, through the participation of people good at handling practical matters as educators, to offer practical education with a keen awareness that becomes a bridge to practices.

Professional graduate schools are expected to be developed for a wide range of fields, including: 1) fields related to national qualifications; 2) fields requiring specific advanced job skills; and 3) fields that require the cultivation of human resources that meets international standards.

Currently, professional graduate schools have already been established in fields such as business management, public health and public policy. From FY2004, graduate law schools will be set up as professional graduate schools that provide education specialized for legal practices.

Today, along with the internationalization of economy and finance, and the increase in disputes that require professional knowledge such as that of intellectual property rights, there is a need for a great number of high-quality legal professionals that can address the diverse and wide-ranging demands of the people.

Regarding the number of people in the legal profession, until FY1990, the annual number of people passing the national bar examination was about 500. This number has steadily increased since FY1991, with 1,170 passing the exam in FY2003.

However, it has been pointed out that competition to pass the bar exam has grown excessively intense. The examination pass rate has remained at only 2 to 3 percent in recent years, and the average successful applicant is 26 to 28 years of age.

At the same time, faculties of law at universities are responsible for the unique significance and function of sending numerous human resources equipped with legal education out into various fields in society, and it cannot be said that they always provide education that is specialized to the national bar examination. For this reason, many students aiming for the national bar examination put more priority on studying for the examination at a privately operated preparatory classes for national bar examination than their university classes (so-called "tendency away from attending university classes," "two-tracked schooling"). It has been pointed out that this situation is growing marked, the trend to emphasize test-taking ability is growing stronger, and in other ways a serious influence is being exerted on the securing of quality in the legal profession.

Therefore, in order to greatly increase the number of people in the legal profession while securing the "quality" of legal professionals demanded by 21st century society, the "graduate law school" was conceived as a central educational institution for the cultivation of new legal professionals as a "process" that closely coordinates legal education, the national bar examination and legal training, rather than making selections using only the "marks" of the national bar examination.

The graduate law school is structured to carry out over three years a thorough education that cultivates legal professionals who possess diverse expertise and can be active in the real world. For example, this education for students who have studied non-legal fields such as economics and medicine will include: classes with small numbers of students in debate format that presuppose sufficient preparation by students; legal professionals in practice as educators and case studies based on real-life examples; and the provision of opportunities to come into contact with real practices during a fixed concentrated period of time at a law firm.