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The story
The Japan Teachers’ Union (Nikkyoso) has submitted a proposal to a special subcommittee of the Central Council for Education, calling for annual class hours to be cut from the current 1,015 periods to 875 periods in elementary school and 945 periods in junior high school, as part of the next course of study guidelines set to begin in fiscal 2030. The article notes that under the union’s proposal, Japan’s class hours would fall below the OECD average (804 hours, 2025) and drop to the lowest level among OECD member countries. The proposal split opinion on 5ch: some users pushed back, saying “Demanding we don’t cut teachers while demanding we cut classes is awfully convenient,” while others defended the union, arguing the real problem isn’t the number of class periods but the ballooning workload on teachers — things like shifting after-school clubs to local communities and rising special-needs support duties.
Regarding the next course of study guidelines set to take effect in fiscal 2030, the Japan Teachers’ Union (Nikkyoso) revealed on the 15th a proposal calling for annual class hours to be reduced from the current 1,015 periods (grades 4 through 9) to 875 periods in elementary school and 945 periods in junior high school.
The average annual class time among OECD member countries is 804 hours for elementary school (2025). Converting the union’s proposed number of periods into hours works out to 660 hours — the lowest level among OECD countries.
The proposal was presented during a hearing of stakeholder groups held by a special subcommittee of the Central Council for Education (Chukyoshin), which is deliberating the content of the next guidelines.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
it's really just 'don't cut teachers, don't cut pay' — that's all this is, Nikkyoso.
Of course it is?
That's just what a labor union does.
Same with shifting clubs to the community — they should've hired more teachers for that too,
but instead they dumped it all on parents and now it's a disaster.
Re: #12
With the total number of kids shrinking, increasing staff is probably tough.
Besides, even if they hired more teachers for clubs, where's the money supposed to come from?
Teacher numbers have actually gone up a lot.
Like teachers who teach Japanese to foreign-national students,
or teachers assigned to borderline special-needs kids, and special-needs class teachers.
Why does it keep declining regardless of education?
Re: #23
Nobody wants to become a teacher, so increasing the numbers is a non-starter.
Why not just coexist with AI or something?
For self-study, a teacher who just motivates kids would be enough.
It's the decline of home learning.
Especially home learning for ages 3-5 falling apart — that's huge.
They could just hire more teachers,
but instead it's 'cut class hours'?
Back in the day, one teacher handled 45 kids,
but now it's two teachers for 20 kids.
And on top of that, they want to cut class hours too?
Way too soft on them.
It was one teacher for 30 kids.
When there were lots of students you could just leave them be, but now that each teacher handles fewer kids, you have to watch them closely — the old days were actually easier.
This, for real.
Back then kids were just left to their own devices.
Now every single kid needs individualized attention — I think it's harder today.
Teachers can just cover everything outside of class, so you could cut teacher numbers in half.
AI still can't handle tracking every individual kid's traits and quirks.
Either they're being made to do unnecessary work, or the work itself is just inefficient.
It's just a fact lol
Re: #34
Once you're able to keep a closer eye on kids, you end up having to.
The curriculum guidelines just keep expanding and never get trimmed.
I do think it's genuinely tough.
Huh? So they've been working overtime this whole time? Were they getting paid overtime for it? If not, then it was within normal working hours, wasn't it.
Sounds like they just want time off and don't care about kids' education.
Slacker teachers, huh?
Back then there was a training day once a week and plenty of long breaks, so teachers could grow both their teaching skills and themselves as people.
Now they have no choice but to prep lessons at home.
Exactly this.
These days cram schools basically just have kids watch videos and do problem sets anyway.
That only works for kids who already have some baseline comprehension.
Not feasible for elementary and junior high.
You trying to disrespect regular salarymen, huh?
A regular salaried worker (8-hour days, two days off a week) puts in roughly 1,960 to 2,080 scheduled hours a year.
For a university credit, one hour of class is paired with three hours of at-home study to make one unit.
The same goes for the person teaching — one hour of class needs three hours of prep.
Just use AI already lol
The content being taught is fixed anyway, so just have teachers nationwide share materials lmao
I don't want to be taught by someone that clueless lmao
Textbooks already come with teacher's reference guides.
The issue isn't the subject content — it's grasping each individual student's level and personality.
Current AI is nowhere near capable of that.
AI isn't a teacher.
Going forward, it's about ditching rote cramming
and raising people who can wield AI to actually produce results — that's the era we're heading into.
Gen Z was supposed to be the post-yutori generation — so why did they turn out even more 'like that' than the yutori generation?
Class hours were gradually restored bit by bit, only fully recovering just a few years ago.
Meaning Gen Z got yutori-style education too.
Weakened home study because both parents work,
plus entrance exams overweighting English.
Yeah, that's exactly where this ends up — Japan's future competitiveness just disappears.
Honestly, everyone younger than today's high schoolers is already clearly dumber than Gen Z.
Background and Key Points of This Debate
The current figure of 1,015 annual class periods (grades 4 through 9) is the result of the “anti-yutori” policy shift roughly 20 years ago that increased class hours. The union’s proposal would roll that back to 875 periods for elementary school and 945 for junior high. Weighed against the article’s OECD comparison (804 hours, 2025), the union’s proposal would push Japan down to the lowest level among OECD countries — which is what’s fueling the “is this really okay?” reactions. It’s worth noting this proposal is still just one group’s request submitted to a special subcommittee of the Central Council for Education, not a finalized decision. The thread split into two camps: one argued the real issue isn’t the number of class periods but teachers’ overall workload (clubs shifting to local communities, rising special-needs and Japanese-language instruction, and the burden of individualized attention per student), while the other argued that cutting class hours itself will simply drag down academic ability — a return to yutori-style education. Notably, both camps agree on one point: teachers should be increased, but securing the funding and the people to do it is difficult.
*This article is compiled by excerpting and summarizing the 5ch (Breaking News+) thread “[Education] Japan Teachers’ Union proposes cutting annual class hours — elementary school down from 1,015 to 875 periods a year, citing teachers’ working hours.”
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