To get an American education (or not)

In Japan and Korea the question was raised often of whether an American education really helps the returning student from either of these countries to prosper and find a place within society again. As educators and administrators of educational programs, the members of the Linden Tour group had all heard the sad stories of foreign graduates of American universities returning to their countries and being rejected because, somehow, they'd missed the "right" education by electing, as they did, to go overseas to study. The following represents what I gathered as an answer.

In Japan I was told that one of the reasons Japanese males did not often leave Japan for the US to study science was that they did not need to. Japan is full of technical universities and, in fact, in Fukui, where I visited, there were more than one of these institutes. All the classes I observed contained only male students, diligently completing their assignments and working on their projects. The same was true of university classes where science and technology were the main foci: the classes were almost totally male. In Korea at Yonsei University, there were a few female students in these traditionally male academic areas. Although I was assured that, in Japan, female students were enrolled, it was obvious that these disciplines were the domain of males.

Female students, on the other hand, do often leave Japan to study in the USA. According to one Japanese guidance counselor at the St. Maur International School in Tokyo, Japanese women do benefit career-wise and socially from having degrees from US schools but the story is different for Japanese men. According to her, when Japanese males leave the education system, they lose their footing and the contacts they would make by remaining in Japan, so that when they return after years away, they have to spend a lot of time trying to re-enter the system, while Japanese women, somewhat new to the professional employment scene, have an easier time entering.

Japanese males who came to the USA for education tend to be the ones who have finished their undergraduate degrees first in Japan and seek graduate degrees here in the USA to augment their Japanese degrees. Japanese males who want to change their career path after having graduated from Japanese universities and worked for a few years might choose a US education. They also came often to the USA to study English or to study specific disciplines that are recognized in Japan as being superior here (ie, management, certain medical research, etc.). Japanese males who are labeled "different" (ie, those who simply do not fit easily into conservative Japanese society) might also study in the USA.

Several Japanese women complained that finding employment might not be as difficult in Japan as it used to be, but it was after their employment that their real difficulties started. These women seemed to feel marginalized and passed over for better opportunities in some ways. One woman told me that her stay in the USA to get a degree in hotel management had been like a breath of fresh air. She felt free and unrestrained by societal forces, she said, for the first time in her life. But this is another story.

In Korea, the story is similar in many ways to Japan, but with its own little twists here and there. Korea, too, has its share of science and technical institutes and universities. Korean males - in fact, all students - seeking undergraduate degrees were encouraged to seek them first in Korea. I was often warned that males seeking education outside Korea were often those who did not fit into Korean society for any number of reasons from being juvenile delinquents to being irresponsible, or they were students who might have other reasons for attempting to study in the US, especially if they had relatives here.

For those Koreans seeking an academic career, the university where they found employment would look most kindly upon their application if they had attended this particular university as an undergraduate and had gone overseas to an elite US university for a doctorate. Almost all Korean professors have doctorates from foreign (mostly US and British) universities, claimed one Fullbright scholar in Seoul. Korean women benefited from having a degree from a US university as an undergraduate more often than men, who were penalized because they failed to have the necessary contacts to establish themselves after receiving their diplomas. Korean women were better represented among the workers, and as a result seemed to have gotten more job opportunities.

It seems that females choosing to study overseas had a better time re-entering their societies and finding jobs compared to males. Males who went to elite US universities had an easier time re-entering than those who did not. Males and females choose to study overseas to advance themselves in language and in graduate studies most often. Males who left to study overseas as undergraduates might be seen somewhat as "misfits" in their societies. There was less such suspicion toward females, who might prosper more.

The competition is fierce to attract Japanese and Korean students who seek an education abroad. The US is still the choicest destination for most, but Australia, New Zealand and Britain have significantly cut into the US domination of this category. Particularly in Japan, the local schools are also trying to attract and keep such students by being more flexible-providing part-time jobs, giving time-off for work and offering monetary rewards to these students who might otherwise go abroad.

The competition does not stop here. In some other (particularly Asian) countries, such as Malaysia and Thailand, there has been a swift rise in the number of "international" universities - that is, universities that teach in an English language medium. These universities tend to have science and technology curricula and are able to attract students from less advanced economies who would not be able to afford an education in countries with advanced economies, such as the US and Britain.