Studying abroad - working part-time and then becoming... 'illiterate'

Many Vietnamese students go to Japan to study, accept hard work to pay off debt, and are even cheated, and in the end their academic results decline.

Studying abroad in Japan is a craze for students who dream of getting rich quickly or love to explore. However, when they come to Japan, many international students cannot attend courses or achieve low results because they spend too much time working part-time to pay off debt.

These debts are mostly due to them accepting loans from study abroad brokerage companies and study abroad consultants with the sole purpose of going to Japan.

In the case of Nguyen Van Hai (Ky Anh, Ha Tinh), he accepted to drop out of his second year of study at Ha Tinh University, following the invitation of Japanese study abroad consulting companies based in Vinh City, to borrow money to go to Japan to both study and earn money.

According to brokers here, there are two easy ways to make money in Japan: going to work abroad or studying at a Japanese language school, vocational school, or college. The fee is 10,000 USD (about 220 million VND) including tuition fees, airfare, procedures, documents, etc.

When he came to Japan, Hai only had to go to school one session a day, and work part-time during the day and at night, earning between 1,500 and 2,000 USD. Hai calculated that with this income in Japan, if he worked hard for 5 years, he would have quite a bit of capital.

However, when he arrived in Japan, the harsh reality here made Hai realize that the invitations were just a pipe dream. Hai said that studying took up a lot of time, plus the tuition fees at the school were expensive (nearly 200 million/year) and the debt of 250 million to the consulting company to go to Japan, so to have money to pay for his studies and living expenses, Hai had to do many extra jobs such as: cleaning toilets, packing goods at supermarkets... to have money to send back home to pay off the debt.

"Some days, I have to work all night and go to school in the morning, so I'm very tired," Hai said.

International students in Japan sleep around at their part-time jobs after work.

Tran Quoc Tuan in Ha Tinh also encountered a similar situation as Hai above. In 2013, after graduating from Da Nang University, unable to find a job, Tuan's family mortgaged their house to borrow money for Tuan to study abroad at the Japanese Language Institute (Tokyo). Tuan calculated that with the part-time salary of about 35 - 40 million VND that the consultant gave him, he would pay off his debt in less than a year.

But when the regulation was set for students to work no more than 28 hours/week, Tuan had to work more than 80 hours/week to cover living expenses and send home about 10 million VND/month. According to Tuan, most of the international students who have recently come to Japan have the purpose of earning money, so they take advantage of part-time jobs anytime, anywhere.

According to the Hanoi Department of Education and Training, in 2015, the Japanese study abroad market exploded with 15,265 international students. The number of companies and organizations providing study abroad consulting services for this market alone registered 169 new units last year. Studying abroad for the purpose of earning money, many international students violate the law, working more than 28 hours/week, leading to poor academic results.

Ms. Tanaka Mizuki - Second Secretary of the Cultural Affairs Department (Embassy of Japan in Vietnam) explained that the sudden increase in the number of international students was due to confusion between the purpose of work and the status of international students. According to Ms. Tanaka Mizuki, some study abroad consulting companies provided inaccurate and untrue information. Therefore, international students had to suffer the consequences when they were burdened with loans and had to find ways to pay for living expenses.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Thanh Minh, Deputy Director of the Department of Foreign Training (Ministry of Education and Training), said that next year, the Hanoi Department of Education and Training needs to strengthen inspections and revoke operating licenses of consulting units that violate regulations; and publicize the list of licensed units so that people can know and avoid being scammed.

According to Tienphong.vn