Nearly 5 percent of all public schools in Japan lack a full roster of teachers, forcing administrators and temporary hires to fill the empty slots, according to the education ministry’s first study on the matter.
A district court judge in Saitama close to Tokyo who rejected a teacher s claim for compensation for unpaid overtime nevertheless acknowledged that teachers were getting a raw deal under a special measures law governing salaries and called for it to be updated to reflect their increased workloads.
Students at Sarugaku Elementary School in Tokyo s Shibuya Ward got the bad news that many others in Japan have heard over the past year during the novel coronavirus pandemic.
The nurse’s office at a junior high school in Tokyo sees a daily surge of students complaining of illnesses like stomachaches due to the stress caused by the ongoing pandemic. (Yukihito Takahama)
More than a year of the pandemic upending students’ lives has led to reports of an increasing number frequently visiting school nurse’s offices, skipping classes and generally struggling to adapt to their situations.
Education facilities imposed strict behavioral restrictions in efforts to contain the pandemic, piling extra stress onto students at elementary and junior high schools who are finding it difficult to share their troubles with adults, according to new data.