Mobility of higher education students, institutions and programmes

Projects/initiatives

The major initiatives of the Government of Japan for the internationalization of higher education include:

Top Global University Project (スーパーグローバル大学創成支援事業)

The Top Global University Project is a funding project that aims to enhance the international competitiveness of higher education in Japan. It provides support for world-class and innovative universities that lead the internationalization of Japanese universities. A total of 37 programmes have been  selected for this project and 550,000 students and 80,000 academics have participated in programmes. This is equivalent to 20% of all universities in Japan.

Inter-University Exchange Project (Re-Inventing Japan Project) (大学の世界展開力強化事業)

The Re-Inventing Japan Project is a funding project that aims to foster human resources capable of being globally active, and to assure the quality of mechanisms for the mutual recognition of credits and grade management through an international framework. It does this by giving financial support to efforts for the formation of collaborative programmes with foreign universities that conduct study abroad programmes for Japanese students, and undertakes the strategic acceptance of foreign students. The target area of this project covers Asia, the USA, the EU, Russia, India, and Africa. About 50 programmes have been selected since the start of 2011, with a total of over 15,000 outbound students dispatched and 13,000 inbound students accepted.

Scholarships for inbound and outbound students

The Japanese Government (MEXT) Scholarship Programme (国費外国人留学生制度), covers  scholarships for privately funded students, while programmes for student exchange provide financial support for international students studying in Japan.

To support outbound mobility students, there are scholarships for degree-seeking students and scholarships for short-term exchange students.

The TOBITATE! Young Ambassador Programme is a new scholarship programme for studying abroad created in cooperation among MEXT, JASSO, and the private sector.