Hey guys! I'm Loretta and welcome back to my channel!
The summer is definitely full on now! It's HOT!
Last week I finished another semester at school here in Japan
and it was a big one because
I am down to my last semester in school.
THE END IS IN SIGHT!
Which means unlike before, no more textbooks. It's all just practical research.
The thing is, since I started grad' school I posted a lot of videos
vlogs about school life and story times from my POV
but after reading all your comments I realized
I never actually talked about WHY I'm going to school in Japan
So I want to lay all the cards on the table and tell you
WHAT I'm doing at a Japanese school and WHY.
The 1st question I always get is: What school am I going to / What am I studying / Is it English or Japanese?
I go to a Japanese national university, the name of which I can't tell you quite yet.
But I promise I will tell you soon!
I study business, I'm getting a Master's degree in Business Administration
it is completely, 100% in Japanese.
The thesis I'm writing, the research I'm doing, everything is in Japanese.
It's a full on graduate school experience.
Which leads to the next question!
#2: WHY am I going to School in Japanese?
Why didn't I just go to school in Japan, in English?
There are American Universities in Japan and schools that teach courses in English.
That is true! So let me be real honest with you:
The first, practical reason is because I'm on a scholarship.
I'm on a MEXT scholarship from the Japanese government
which in most cases on sponsors you to go to Japanese national universities.
Some do have English-based programs, like Keio University, etc.
But you're not going to be able to go to a school like Temple U.
or even a school like Sophia University is very hard to get into on the MEXT scholarship.
MEXT wants true-blue, Japanese colleges
and they want foreign talent going into those schools
That's just the nature of the program in most cases.
I wanted to go to grad school back in the states, but the truth of the matter is
I just couldn't justify the price!
I'd applied to Colombia's Japanese pedagogy program
I looked into a Japanese Studies program at NYU
and after applying and looking at them closely
I felt these were just excuses for me to do something more Japanese
but the price tag just wasn't worth it!
So I just ever enrolled.
But when the MEXT scholarship became an option
I realized that this is something that allows me to go to school for free
but allows me to pick a degree that is more relevant to my actual career.
That leads me into my longer answer, which is basically
Universities have brand value.
There are Ivy League schools in America that are cool just because they're Ivy League's
when they're equally amazing programs at other non^Ivy League schools.
(Go William and Mary!!!)
There's a common narrative, especially for kids in the liberal arts
Where you want to pick a school or degree based on your passions.
From your view your thinking
I want to learn the thing that makes me passionate and makes my gears turn!
That's amazing! That's great!
However, the point of going to University is not to learn something.
The point of going to university is to get a certification that precedes you into your career.
I'm 100% behind people learning and studying their passions
but learning is a lifelong journey and Universities more often than not
are a disguised price tag that are built to give you access to a certain social circle,
to a certain job circle, to a certain career or degree path.
I'm going to go on a tangent here but
certain schools are brand names because
the people in that field understand what it is that you probably know
and what your personality is probably like before you even sit in an interview.
That's why a certain degree is very powerful.
This is something a struggled with when I picked my original undergraduate major
because I love languages, culture and people
so to me it made the most sense to study the thing that I care about
So I got a degree in linguistics and while you couldn't minor in it
I had enough credits to fulfill a minor in International Studies and music.
I graduated happy and smiley and about six months later
The price tag of that same degree was no longer in deferment.
My school loans turned on and it was now time
to pay back for all those years I spent in school.
At the same time I was trying to see that same degree to future employers.
So getting back to my original point, right about now when you are watching this video
It should be about August 4th.
Which is a very big day for me because
it is in fact, my 30th birthday!
Coming to Japan at this point in my life has been a big turning point in my career
I've worked a good handful of strenuous jobs and I realized
that this doesn't necessarily mean something to everyone!
You can learn anything in life and you don't need to pay
tens of thousands of dollars just to do it.
This is something I've been thinking about recently looking at
why I picked my major in Japan and why that's actually meaningful.
In Japan, a liberal arts degree from the College of William Mary is simply a bachelor's degree
a certification to work and get a work visa.
There are a lot of brand name schools around the world
Harvard, Oxford, in Japan there's Tokyo University
but in my field (business), getting in MBA
in English that's NOT form Harvard, means almost nothing.
So getting a MBA from a Japanese university in English
Not only is it the wrong country
but if I didn't even do it in Japanese then that looks more confusing.
However, getting an MBA in Japan in Japanese prepares me to do business in Japan.
So in a nutshell: the reason I'm getting my degree in Japan in Japanese
Japanese is because: (A) I received a scholarship making it free
(B) Doing it in Japanese prepares me to do business in Japan
I have a United States undergraduate and I'm working now on my Japanese masters
which combined, together gives me access to jobs both
In the United States, in Japan and somewhere in between.
The point is that in your individual case and career
no matter where you're going, or if you don't even know
Your diploma/resume is nothing more than a paid elevator pitch
and the first things that introduces you before you walk into an interview.
You make sure that resume says something about why you should be there
so you have a chance to really get in there.
That's it. I promise I'm doing preaching.
I just felt like I had to get that off my chest!
So the next questions is about the Japanese idea of レジャーランド( lit. "leisureland")
I'm not sure if this is a popular word anymore
But it's a word that describes a very true sense of Japanese education
in that, you work REALLY hard to get into schools
but once you're into University, you're good!
Supposedly you just have to graduate at that point.
I got a lot of questions asking if my schools the same.
Obviously my school is hard for me because it's in Japanese
but it's not.......*grunts* :P
I feel like it's a lot easier to get good grades
as long as you do certain things.
Your grades are probably going to be okay
as long as you don't skip class and you do the reading.
In the States I feel like you could get away with never doing the reading
but on your final papers and our tests
but on your tests if you don't have the exact correct information, you could still fail.
You could put in all of your effort and still fail.
In Japan, I was so worried because I knew that my best
is still going to be below a native Japanese speaker
so I worried I'd fail no matter how hard I tried.
Your effort seems to be a lot more weighted than your actual content regurgitation
at least in grad school for me.
I found that as long as you showed you did the work
that you at least tried to do it
did at least the minimum page requirement and showed up to every class
then you will definitely pass and probably do well.
So it's difficult because you have to do all the work
but you don't have to be perfect.
So, getting on to the last part
I want to tell you WHAT it is that I'm actually studying.
Shakai Kagaku-fu Keieigaku Senkou Hakase Katei Zenki (Graduate School of Social Sciences, Business Major, Pre-PhD)
In English the closest thing is probably a Masters in Business Administration, an MBA
but because its Hakase-Katei Zenki, the pre-course to the PhD track
it's a lot more thesis/writing heavy
and my thesis! I should explain that...
In the modern age because of the internet there's this common belief
that you can connect with any person, business, or country easily because of our digital connections.
In the business world there is a theory from Harvard Business School
specifically from Pankaj Ghemawat, around this idea of the flat world or globalization.
there's a theory that these concepts have created a bias
a lot of businesses, especially internet startups
set themselves up for failure because they assume they have access to an infinite market
to in customer, in any country, anywhere
simply because they put a website on the Internet in multiple languages.
The thing is that this is a bias!
For example the case when Google tried to expand into China
that did not go over so well because
there's a lot of regulation around what can be put on the internet and what can be shared between people.
So coming from America you think everybody uses Google
but in China they have their own in-house services like Baidu, etc.
like that the idea that Google and web searching would be easy in Russia
by the context of its language the language the Russian language is so complex
that the way that search terms and SEO works in English
it doesn't work the same way it does in Russian and it doesn't lend itself to that type of search.
So it was very difficult for these big, giant companies
It was harder and it took a lot more money to actually try to get to these markets
so my thesis is looking at that theory of bias and what does it actually mean
to be a business in the global age specifically in the context of Japan.
Japan right now has its own set of biases specifically around the Olympics
and specifically around the ideas of globalization
this idea that there's an infinite market of foreign people that they can market to if they just speak English
With Rakuten and the Englishnization movement
there's this idea that if we can just be more English-ready
we can have our hands in markets all across the world!
My thesis is that no, that is not necessarily the case!
So my research is based on case studies and interviews
with Japanese corporate managers asking does their strategy actually make sense
Is their strategy biased?
In addition to that narrative
I'm matching this with a market survey
asking people around the world what they think of Japanese companies
How do they interact with companies in Japan that are trying to connect with them?
What are the pain points?
What is the disconnect between Japanese companies and the people who love Japanese stuff.
So I'm really excited! Like this tiny IC recorder
is every precious interview that I've been doing with Japanese companies
I feel like this is the golden treasure of everything I've built; my life's work!
So that's kind of what I've launched in these past few weeks
and what I'll be doing all year before I (hopefully) graduate!
The reason I bring this up also is
because I want to invite anyone who's interested!
You can actually help me out an participate!
The survey is going for a few more weeks
It's open answer and requires you to write as little or as much as you want
The survey is available in 8 different languages
so please pick the language that you are most comfortable with
if you've never been in Japan that's fine
If you've ever like anything Japanaese, anything whatsoever and you want to help me out with my research
I'll leave a link below!
We're kind of all over the board today
But I'm at a huge turning point right now and I kind of wanted to share that with you.
If you have any questions, comments, ideas etc leave them in a comment below
and I will see you there!
Thank you so much for watching today!
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