Last-Place Student Gets Into Meiji University Straight Out of High School — “Wait, Is This a Prep School?” 5ch Weighs In

Background and Key Points of This Discussion

Behind this topic lies a difference in evaluation standards between private universities’ “designated-school recommendation” system and the general entrance exams used by national and public universities. Because recommendation slots are awarded based on a student’s in-school record (regular exam scores and attendance), students with well-rounded performance across subjects tend to have the advantage. A grueling general-exam track like Todai’s Science III, by contrast, tests a student’s ability to break through in specific subjects — so the two use different yardsticks and can’t simply be compared. The thread’s disagreement essentially came down to whether “overall strength on the in-school record” or “exam-breakthrough ability” should count as the true measure of academic ability. The fact that the poster’s school doesn’t split classes by humanities and sciences also made it harder to judge whether it really counts as a prep school — and since some schools (such as those feeding into an affiliated university) have a low bar for internal advancement, this also shows the limits of judging a school’s level by university names alone. It’s also worth noting that the text never makes clear what subjects or time period the “last place” and “top” rankings were actually based on, so the numbers shouldn’t be taken entirely at face value.