Education New college forced to halt admissions due to low enrollment

The shrinking of Japan's higher education has started: the newly opened Professional University of Electric Mobility Systems in Iide, Yamagata Prefecture, has suspended student admissions due to a lack of interest, dealing a blow to this town's aspirations of developing into a "battery valley."


Only four students—one freshman and three sophomores—are enrolled at the Professional University of Electric Mobility Systems. The university opened in April 2023 and initially aimed to enrol 40 students per grade. However, insufficient public relations and student interest have led to its current predicament. The university's president, Hiroshi Shimizu, expressed deep regret and acknowledged the institution's failure to attract students. Iide town, which had hoped to position itself as a "battery valley," has also expressed disappointment over the outcome. Akamon Gakuin, the university operator, received significant subsidies from the town to establish the institution. The university's future remains uncertain as it grapples with low enrollment and public relations challenges.

The college said it "sought until the last minute" ways to improve its business situation or transfer control of the school to another corporation. But all those efforts proved fruitless. For that reason, Katsumyo Kokubun, who chairs Akamon Gakuin, apparently made the final call to suspend admissions. In September, when the university explained its decision to stop accepting new admissions, students and their guardians voiced concerns about whether classes would take place as scheduled. Toshihiro Koseki, the university's secretary-general, promised that classes would continue until the students graduate. "They can expect assistance from us in finding employment, too," Koseki said. After the current freshman leaves the school in March 2028, the university may well shut its doors for good.

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It's crazy that they are continuing with the handful of students they have. Four total??

That is truly in the middle of a brutally rural "nowhere". But you might be able to reconfigure it as either a Japanese language university (maybe geared toward healthcare, targeting prospective employees of Japan's retirement homes), or go the opposite route and reconfigure it as an English language institute, attracting the best teachers from Japan's bloated English conversation industry, and trying to turn it into a miniature island of immersive English language teaching/culture.

Or, maybe find some way to turn it into a kind of campus for foreigners hoping to buy and renovate Japan's famed akiya (empty homes). Educate prospective buyers on how to buy and renovate, and/or how to convert them to minshuku or other types of accommodation. Give them the whole arsenal of information; legal, financial, cultural, etc... I think you'd need to target foreigners outside of Japan, so the government would have to support it with some sort of scheme to allow students into the country on an education visa, which could be converted to residential or maybe business, pending successful completion of the course.

But man....that campus is smack dab in the middle of a whole lotta nuthin.