North Kanto Notes

Sunday, April 23, 2017

March for Science's Blindspot

Japanese awareness of humankind's contribution to global warming is among the highest in the world. The same is true for public acceptance of evolution. These are two of the facts that are front and center in the March for Science.

Then why was March for Science in Japan such a failure. Only two were held in the whole country, in Tokyo and Tsukuba. Nothing in Kansai. Nothing in Tohoku. Nothing in Kyushu. Participation at the marches was at the level of a large family picnic. Japanese participation hovered near zero.

Part of the problem is likely competition from numerous Earth Day celebrations. At least 10 were held across Japan. Earth Day Tokyo is in its 28th year and annually attracts more than 100,000 attendees. In contrast to Washington, D.C., where Earth Day and March for Science coordinated, March for Science Tokyo was unable to work with Earth Day Tokyo.

But the main problem, I think, is in the failure of March for Science to recognize that the war against facts in the United States is deeply rooted in that country's systemic racism. Indeed, March for Science itself has been accused of being a microcosm of liberal racism.

Opposition to climate change is but one example of Lee Atwaters's Rules.

The late, legendarily brutal campaign consultant Lee Atwater explains how Republicans can win the vote of racists without sounding racist themselves:

[Edited] You start out in 1954 by saying, “N----r, n----r, n----r.” By 1968 you can’t say “n----r”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “N----r, n----r.”

Views on evolution and creationism have even stronger ties to racism.

Why is March for Science blind to racism? Perhaps this is because public schools in the United States are highly segregated and strongly favor whites. Except for the addition of immigrants, America's science establishment is a product of this school system. American science is very much a part of the problem it is protesting.

Until scientists go beyond generic diversity statements to combat the racism that is behind the war on facts, they will make no progress on facts in public policy.

While March for Science should be grateful for international help, it needs to recognize that the struggle it is fighting was made in the USA and cannot expect others to simply jump on their bandwagon. It also needs to show some humility. The rest of the world did not cause or even contribute to American science's current fix.

The problem is not Americans' blindness toward science; it is American science's blindness and complicity to its own systemic misogyny and racism.

Monday, April 3, 2017

International Community Populations in Tsukuba and Ibaraki

Tsukuba, 3 April 2017. These are the most recent statistics available for populations of foreign residents in Ibaraki Prefecture.

	Total Pop	Foreign	China	South Korea	Philip- pines	Viet- nam	Brazil	Nepal	USA	Taiwan	Other
Mito	270859	3311	657	805	394	313	26	124	108	36	848
Hitachi	187503	1727	418	202	592	52	24	34	43	20	342
Tsuchiura	142567	3535	643	278	888	165	451	50	29	139	892
Koga	141952	2909	444	173	888	260	205	31	18	62	828
Ishioka	77302	947	153	106	165	40	71	10	9	64	329
Yuki	51726	2035	273	28	317	260	360	173	7	21	596
Ryugasaki	79279	1476	367	101	353	69	92	26	21	24	423
Shimotsuma	43829	1808	191	40	354	127	160	30	9	56	841
Joso	63634	4614	268	64	1096	190	2023	36	3	30	904
Hitachi Ota	53684	133	41	18	23	8	2	6	6	1	28
Takahagi	29815	144	23	20	32	3	20	5	7	1	33
Kitaibaraki	44782	242	42	47	39	14	13	0	7	1	79
Kasama	77723	605	100	54	101	35	73	17	16	12	197
Toride	107310	1471	368	167	161	158	132	131	27	36	291
Ushiku	83531	1117	249	76	159	27	322	20	19	29	216
Tsukuba	219402	9059	3222	898	374	381	323	129	228	262	3242
Hitachinaka	156964	1427	448	113	333	102	28	37	44	27	295
Kashima	66700	913	190	113	190	56	36	11	21	43	253
Itako	29621	324	46	25	47	10	11	13	5	15	152
Moriya	63693	770	208	115	66	53	118	7	32	31	140
Hitachi Omiya	43496	248	50	48	24	22	27	6	7	4	60
Naka	53835	211	43	30	47	25	0	7	8	3	48
Chikusei	105816	2171	196	106	475	143	224	34	10	61	922
Bando	55275	2131	273	107	401	208	67	40	14	35	986
Inashiki	44556	938	206	52	142	79	51	13	5	23	367
Kasumigaura	42515	1035	102	24	77	64	292	0	5	7	464
Sakuragawa	43826	291	76	25	37	30	8	8	5	7	95
Kamisu	94143	2264	633	104	393	162	185	0	13	145	629
Namagata	35967	946	395	17	86	83	5	10	5	10	335
Hokota	48355	2251	764	48	111	543	1	7	4	11	762
Tsukubamirai	46517	507	83	71	81	64	51	6	7	19	125
Omitama	51844	1262	209	72	120	171	42	5	8	34	601

Ibaraki total	2933381	58182	12510	4403	9352	4359	5743	1085	785	1339	18606

2016-10 Total population stats from http://www.pref.ibaraki.jp/hokenfukushi/koso/iji/koso/stachischics/health-welfare-report/2013.html

2016-12 Foreign population stats from http://www.e-stat.go.jp/SG1/estat/List.do?lid=000001177523

Sunday, March 26, 2017

Sending your elementary school child to cram school in Tsukuba, some comments

The only reason to go to cram school while in elementary school is to get into Namiki or Meikei. Those are integrated junior-senior high schools, both tier 1. (Namiki is public; Meikei is private.) Their students do not have to worry about cramming for senior high school entrance exams. Other than Namiki and Meikei, there are only two tier 1 public high schools in the area, Takezono and Tsuchiura 1. Cram schools are almost essential in getting into one of them. Unfortunately, in this area there is a big gap between tier 1 and tier 2 public high schools. (Ushiku Eishin and Tsuchura 2 are the two tier 2 schools in the area.)

[Added note: In American terminology, Takezono, Tsuchiura 1, Namiki and Meikei can be called exam schools (http://educationnext.org/exam-schools-from-the-inside). Meikei is private and makes its own entrance exams. The other three are run by Ibaraki Prefecture, which develops one exam each year for all prefectural high schools. These four high schools operate on the assumption that all students will go on to universities.]

The tier 1 high schools themselves are effectively cram schools. Like the jr high cram schools, they pack 3 years of materials into the first 2 years and spend the 3rd year on review and practice exams. (Takezono 3rd year students only have one new textbook.) Several of the practice exams are run by cram school chains, Kawai and Benesse. Results come back with ratings versus their selected target universities, plus quite detailed diagnostics. Other "short" tests are 10-min, 4-subject quizes with more than any student can handle - simply to get them accustomed to hitting the ground running.

We send our son, now a 3rd yr HS student at Takezono, to cram school for math starting late in his 2nd year Yatabe JHS. We've continued with cram school math in high school because there is an excellent instructor who specializes in Takezono HS math.

We are very pleased with the results. Our son went from hating math to loving it. A key seemed to be have friends-cum-rivals to team up with and compete with.

I have come to appreciate the system here, even though it is completely alien from my rural public schools in MN of 45 years ago.

Compartmentalization: What President Obama accomplished on his Asia trip

"Compartmentalization" is my working view of President Obama's main accomplishment on his Asia trip. The only visible action in Japan was his statement that the US is bound by treaty to defend Japan's administration of the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands. He still gave China one avenue to pursue, the International Court of Justice.

The effect of his statement will be to reduce the chances of a nasty surprise over the possession of these islands. A side effect is to essentially sideline Japan so that the US can pursue engagement with China with less attention to Japan's views. The US has concluded that Japan will not become a constructive partner with respect to China, so it will settle for Japan on the sidelines.

Friday, April 25, 2014

Regional Revitalization from the Ground Up

In his history of Tochigi Prefecture¹, Masami Omachi describes concerns that Fumitsugu Okada, Tochigi Governor between 1911 and 1914, had about plans for two new rail lines. One railway, the Moka Line, would connect the pottery industry around Mashiko to a trunk railway at Shimodate in Ibaraki Prefecture. The other railway, the Ashio Line, would connect the Ashio copper mine to a trunk railway at Kiryu in Gumma Prefecture. Governor Okada worried that, because these two railways would connect to other prefectures, they would detract economically and administratively from Tochigi.

The notion that new 'sidedoor' rail connections for moving local products to markets would be viewed as a threat to local economy and government floated unmoored in my mind until a seminar on attracting industry for regional revitalization.

This seminar, "Attracting Industry and Regional Revitalization: Changing Cannot to Can," was put on by the Ken-Oh-Do corridor development association² and featured two speakers. Both speakers can be considered authoritative representatives of current thinking in Japan.

Yasumasa Takano is Director of the Industrial Location Department at the Japan Industrial Location Center (JILC). According to its website, JILC is an independent public agency working in regional and industrial planning and implementation under the auspices of the Ministry of Economic Trade and Industry (METI). A bureaucrat, Mr. Takano presented a bureaucrat's view of industrial location trends and forces in Japan - a PowerPoint presentation with handouts loaded with facts, figures and charts, but without the slides.

From Mr. Takano's presentation, I concluded that JILC and its bureaucratic split with JETRO are two of the greatest impediments for FDI. Extremely parochial.

Toshiaki Kimura's position is Evangelist for Regional Vitality in the Cabinet Secretariat. From 1984 until joining the Cabinet Secretariat in 2006, Mr. Kimura worked in the economic development sections of Otaru City, Hokkaido. A celebrity with a blog, Twitter account and Facebook page, Mr. Kimura used a whiteboard and black marker for his presentation. This fluid motivational talk was filled with local stories, starting with one from his hometown of Nishiokoppe, a village in Hokkaido that is home to 1200 people and 30,000 deer.

Notes and References:

¹Masami Omachi, Tochigi Ken no Hyakunen (One Hundred Years of Tochigi Prefecture), Yamakawa Shuppan, 1986, pp. 113-114, http://amzn.to/twgSkD
²Ibaraki-ken Kenodo Ensen Chiiki Sangyo Koryu Kasseika Kyogikai (茨城県圏央道沿線地域産業・交流活性化協議会), literally translated as "Association for Revitalization of Regional Industry and Exchange Along the Ken-O-Do Expressway in Ibaraki Prefecture," was established in 2007 as an association of cities and towns along the expressway. The Ken-O-Do Expressway is an outer ring around Tokyo that will connect Narita International Airport through a band of industrial exurbs. Website: http://www.ken-o-do-ibaraki.com/site_gaiyo/index.html (accessed 2012 March 4)

Singing in the park

Overheard in the park and sung by elementary students walking home from school: When I get to be a first grader, when I get to be a first grader, my friend will commit suicide. 一年生になったら、一年生になったら友達が自殺するかな。

This is a based on a very widely sung preschool song: When I get to be a first grader, when I get to be a first grader, I will make 100 friends.一年生になったら一年生になったらともだち100人ができるかな。