July 2 & 4, 2025

Kira Yoshiko, a Japanese Communist Party candidate for the Tokyo constituency in the House of Councilors election, on July 2 voiced her opposition to the Ministry of Education’s proposal to exclude foreign doctoral students from the government’s living expense support program for PhD candidates.

Kira joined a protest organized that day by undergraduate and graduate students near Ikebukuro Station, and gave a speech urging the government to refrain from opting for the discriminative policy against foreign students.

A first-year PhD student at Ochanomizu University noted that “profitable research” is now encouraged, and angrily asked, “What’s next, bringing xenophobia into research?” A former graduate student at Tsukuba University expressed her concern that limiting the support program only to Japanese nationals “may be seen as a symbol of Japanese society’s attempt to exclude foreigners.” A former doctoral student at the University of Tokyo Graduate School, also voiced concerns, stating, “It could lead to the exclusion of minorities.”

The Ministry of Education has decided on the proposal to limit the Support for Pioneering Research Initiated by the Next Generation (SPRING) program, which provides living expense support for doctoral students without the need for repayment, to Japanese students only, not international students. Currently, eligible PhD students receive up to 2.4 million yen per year in living expenses. Recipients are determined by the university that adopted the SPRING program which has no nationality requirements.

The ministry’s proposal to revise the SPRING program has been criticized not only by students and graduate students, but also by faculty members. The Niigata University Staff Union has issued a statement in protest against the ministry’s proposal. The statement said that “excellent foreign students are the lifeline for local public universities to maintain their educational and research activities,” and that excluding them from the program “would curtail or discontinue research activities.”