Japanese students’ English proficiency keeps improving
Tokyo (Jiji Press) — The English proficiency of public junior high school and senior high school students in Japan continues to improve, a recent education ministry survey for fiscal 2024 showed.
The proportion of junior high school third graders with English skills equivalent to Grade 3 or higher in the country’s Eiken proficiency tests stood at 52.4 percent, up by 2.4 percentage points from the previous fiscal 2023 survey.
The share of senior high school third graders with English skills equivalent to Grade Pre-2 or higher Eiken levels was up 1.0 point at 51.6 percent.
The government aims to raise the both figures to at least 60 percent by fiscal 2027.
The ministry has conducted the survey every year since fiscal 2013, except fiscal 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic. The latest survey was based on data for students who had a qualification or score from external certification tests such as Eiken and those who were judged by their school teachers to have equivalent English language skills as of December 2024.
By prefecture and ordinance-designated major city, the city of Saitama marked the highest figure for junior high school third graders with Grade 3 or higher Eiken levels, at 89.2 percent, followed by Fukui Prefecture, at 79.8 percent, and the city of Fukuoka, at 65.9 percent.
The figure exceeded 50 percent in 37 of the 67 prefectures and municipalities covered in the survey. The city of Niigata logged the lowest figure, at 34.5 percent.
For senior high school third graders with English skills equivalent to Grade Pre-2 or higher Eiken levels, 21 of the country’s 47 prefectures hit a share of over 50 percent.
Fukui Prefecture had the highest figure, at 61.2 percent, followed by Tokyo’s 60.5 percent and Kyoto’s 60.2 percent. Kumamoto Prefecture marked the lowest figure, at 42.4 perenct.
The share of senior high school third graders with Grade 2 or higher Eiken levels came to 21.2 percent, up by 1.4 points.
The survey also showed that the share of English teachers with skills equivalent to Grade Pre-1 or higher rose by 1.4 points to 46.2 percent at junior high schools and grew by 1.5 points to 82.2 percent at senior high schools.
The ministry said that there are correlations between teachers’ English proficiency and that of students. “We want to give detailed support to municipalities that have challenges” in improving teachers’ English skills, a ministry official said. /asu
