August 11, 2023 : Japanese National Holiday Called Mountain Day
© 安岡喜晴 (JoyShine)
Today is a national holiday, a Japanese national holiday called Mountain Day.
I set my alarm for 11:40 AM and 12:30 PM, but ended up sleeping until about 2:00 PM.
I got up and played Dissidia FF.
Then I wanted to go to a ramen shop, but it was crowded, so I went to Holly's Cafe instead and had a parfait and a cup of cocoa.
While I was there, I read an article about a guy who sued a medical school, saying it was unfair that he had been marked down in the entrance exam for being a ronin, a student who had spent an extra year or more retaking the entrance exams.
And he won, and the university was ordered to pay compensation.
This is very surprising news, because it has the potential to change how schools think about selecting applicants.
When I was 20 years old, on the national mock exam I had an 80% or better chance of passing the entrance exams at all private medical schools in Japan except Keio University School of Medicine.
I applied to many schools, but I failed most of them in the interviews, except Nippon Medical School and Kansai Medical University.
I knew I had passed the written exams, yet I was turned down almost everywhere at the interviews, so I assumed that was exactly what the interview score was there for.
They just look to see whether an applicant is a serious and hardworking student.
As for me, my high school grades were at the bottom and I was late for school far too often, so I did not pass the interviews.
I always thought that it was up to the discretion of the schools, but the applicant who sued the school won.
If this is the case, it seems strange to me that 18-year-old students and people in their thirties who have been teaching at prep schools and cram schools should be treated equally.
I wonder if it is good or bad that everything is determined by paper test scores.
I don't know which is better, but at least I don't think that 18-year-old students who spent their junior and senior high school years doing their best to get into schools should be treated the same as me.
I spent those years in a very sloppy way and only adjusted my way of life to get high scores when the entrance exams came around.
The school said it would select applicants equally, and behind that it was applying undisclosed deductions.
Applicants pay the exam fee and prepare on the terms the school publishes, so an undisclosed deduction is not a matter of discretion.
It is closer to a false statement of the conditions.
On that point I agree with the ruling completely.
Even so, maybe because of what I went through, I still think that, however bad the referee's calls are, they would have won if they had scored more.
There is nothing to be done about a call that goes against them.
So I make a point of never blaming outside factors.
And I think we shouldn't say it's discrimination, because it's our fault for becoming a ronin.
Just work hard and make up for it.
No need to sue them.
Just get stronger and blow them away.
I left the cafe, bought some food at the supermarket, and came back home.
Then I played Dissidia FF again while doing computer programming.