I’ve got some emails asking information on studying in Japan.
I found some of them have a long waiting and great ambition to continue study in Japan.
*feel embarrassed because basically i’d no such that great ambition*
Well, I’m not expert, so I will share what I’ve just experienced before.
Hope some info and tips here will help ones who need it.
To continue study in Japan as a master student, there’re several preliminary steps to be noticed :
1) Decide of whether you’re looking for scholarships or self-funding.
But in my personal opinion, I think most of the master students here would find scholarship instead of self-funding, otherwise, they’d better work and earn money in the country or continue study in western countries like United States,maybe?
The scholarship can be from Monbukagakusho-japanese govt scholarship or private scholarships offered by private companies( these can be many : Panasonic Scholarship, Yoshida Scholarship, etc).
Tips : joining the mailing list which has tons of not only scholarships which call for applications, but also a-z tips for the whole process. The other thing, have your eyes and ears widely open for scholarship info, the source can be from your local newspaper, internet, or even info from others
2) Find the professor who’s willing to be your supervisor
As finding professor might be taking quite long time, so at the very first time, you should find the information of the related subject of study in the web of Japan’s universities.
It’s quite hard if you can’t read the Japanese, mostly will be written in Japanese, but no worry there’ll be some departments, specifically some laboratories’ homepage are written in english version. (special note : this also indicates that this department/laboratory probably quite open and has the international students, so it can be your consideration if you want to plan to enroll the english lectures in your study).
Then find the objective of every single department. After finding the right one, you can explore deeper on the laboratory. In Japan, the graduate school department consists of some laboratories, eg. Takayashi laboratory, Kobayashi laboratory).
In the laboratory page, you can find the research topics, publications, etc.
Next step is sending the email to the professor regarding to your interest of his laboratory.
This is the hardest step, since you have to deliver your ideas in good manner. I wrote English version to my professor, because my Japanese’s not good. So you can write either English or Japanese if you’re proficient enough. It’s a bit like applying jobs, you can write a brief introduction of yourself by cv (history education, past research, accomplishment, etc) and telling about your research plan.
The response of the professor here can be long because of several reasons :
a) If you write in English, maybe the Professor will not reply because of their English is not good enough, or they’ll reply, but it takes time for them replying back to you. Or even the worst case, your email will never get any reply.
b) Because they’re busy and will take a bit long to reply to you.
I’ve heard that someone’s get the reply after 2-3 months, or even the worst case, never get any reply like I told before.
Tips : never give up, trying to find another department and try to contact the professor too. Last time, I also sent more than 10, I think. 😉
Point 1) and 2) can be conducted parallely, so you can save the time to make your dream happen soon. But, I think point no 2) is much more important because you’ll have an added value point of being considered to be selected in the next phase of the selection if you’ve already accepted in a laboratory in Japan
3) Informal consent
If the professor shows his interest to accept you in his laboratory, please request the informal consent, it’s like letter of acceptance – recommendation letter from the professor.
If you apply the scholarship, you can attach this or anyway as if you get the scholarship beforehand, later the sponsorship institution will ask you for submitting the informal consent from the professor.
4) Misc, mission to be accomplished (preparation to go to Japan)
Then there’ll be so many things to be done after step 3), like sending the application form to the university, asking for COE – the documents for foreigner who plan to stay for >=1 year, issued by jurisdiction of the Japan Ministry of Justice. COE is also the long waiting worrying part as well, so you’ve to take notice on this part. You can’t apply the student visa if you don’t have COE. And other words, if you have this “powerful letter”, you will have no barrier and be asked no questions in the embassy. Also you can save much time in obtaining the visa.
Tips : pls be careful of every detail in these sequence activities, because every single of them are very critical. Remember, Japan also known as strict-to-the rule and timing is very important!
Above is the just some parts of my experience while the email I received was the one who hasn’t got the scholarship but has already accepted by the professor. So he planned to come to Japan with his own money (self funding). And his next plan after the arrival is to finding the scholarship.
So, in such a case, I recommend you searching some scholarships program after arrival in Japan. Here’s the link :scholarship that you apply directly to the foundation
And another link is scholarship that you apply before coming to Japan
Good luck!
maybe I should go to japan hahahaha! i hate working LOL!
WOW. I stopped reading at second paragraphs ;p.
How about you, Do you study to Japan with scholarship program? I think you are smart and you have a GREAT ambition.
BTW, your English is GOOD. Do you ever studied abroad before Japan?
iya. .kayak aku … dari dulu pengen belajar di jepang ..tapi tetep ngga ada kesempatan …huaaaa…. dah banyak beasiswa yang diapply … jepang memang susah ditaklukkan …(hanya di kasusku…)
@ Marv : hahaha, you can try it Marv. doctoral degree is much easier i think
@ pretty : you already have pretty life there.
So stopping until paragraph 2 is enough, the rest is quite boring (except for ones who need the info :P)
Yes, I’m here with the scholarship program, it’s just lucky me with not a smart-enough brain, and not-ambition-enough as compared to sandi eggi for example.
Thanks for the so many compliments, I am just so so type.
I never studied abroad before, this is my first time staying so far away from Indonesia.
I guess you ever studied abroad (justifying from your good english in your blog), am i right?
@sandy : jangan patah semangat!! yg monbusho dah keluar hasilnya?
Jepang emang rada strict menurut ku untuk banyak hal.
wah minta tips nya dunks 😛
Sorry I don’t believe to what you have said. Of course only the smart person can get the scholarship ;p.
Are you kidding? I don’t speak english well, I never studied abroad, I graduated from local university: Trisakti. I creates my blog to help me improving my english. You can correct my grammar ;p.
@hatjie : tips apa? itu di atas ada tipsnya khan? hehehe..
@pretty : different people has their own measurement, so that’s ok if you don’t believe it.
*democratic type on* 😛
Sometimes, there’s an xxx factors (lucky/effort) do rule in some achievements instead of being so smart, that’s what they call EQ. kekeke.. jadi ceramah?
Your english is good, but you’re still so modest.
anyway, let’s us learn english together! 😉
俺、昔何回か応募してみたけど、失敗だらけ!(笑)
Salam kenal…
Quite advantageous info u gave…
Ak baru ngirim 1 surat perkenalan ke prof, approximately 1 month ago, n haven`t got any reply yet (surely)…
Yg mo ak tanyain, ampe kapan kt hrs nunggu reply prof (krn butuh waktu lama), takutny kalo pas udah apply ke prof lain, trus prof sebelumnya ngebalas, gimana??
Trus, kalo ga salah kan form pendaftaran bakal keluar next feb 08, kalo ak baru lulus around july 08, can I apply Monbusho buat keberangkatan okt 08??
Thankz ^_^
ayo kirim yang banyak … kayak kuis gitu loh … pasti ada yang bales. tapi ngirim nya yang selektif juga.. ke lab yang memang sesuai dengan minat…
@hon3y : satu ga cukup menurut aku.. coba kirim ke lebih dari 1. Di case ku lebih dari 10, yg reply cuman 3. Di case Sandy tuh dia bilang kirim ampe 20.. Ayo semangat.. ^^
Soal tunggu reply dari professor, jangan takut apply ke prof lain, terus dpt email bales dari prof yang awal dikirimi email. Sejauh bisa direspons dengan bahasa yang baik, pasti prof nya mengerti. (apalagi ini baru tahap awal), ada juga temenku yang sudah sempet diurusin ini itu ama profesor sampe dapat rekomendasi, terus ganti professor. Emang kurang baik sih kalau dah diurusin gini gitu terus pindah prof.. Tapi kalau bisa dijelaskan dengan baik, harusnya tidak masalah.
Wah soal Monbusho, coba tanya ke Sandy deh.
Aku kurang ngerti juga bisa atau ga soal hubungan kelulusan fresh grad langsung berangkat.. Tapi ya mulai sekarang dah nyari2 prof, sepertinya tepat.. 🙂
@Sandy : pls bantuin hon3y jawab mengenai pendaftaran, kelulusan dan keberangkatan..
Siapa tahu kamu tahu.. 🙂 thanks
Willy.. aku yg promosiin blog ini ke hon3y, kalian punya passion yg sama ttg Jepang, pasti klop deh 🙂
@Sakuralady: Arigatou ne… Ak bakal tulis surat lagi deh kalo gitu, moga2 yg selanjutny ga dikacangin ;p
@Sandy: Thankz bgt supportnya ;D
@Jiewa: Makasiiii udah promosiin yahh ^_^v
wahahaha.. perjuangan ku cari beasiswa lewat profesor dan embassy kayaknya ngga ada yang berhasil. 😀 cuman kontak2 dengan professor bisa ada manfaatnya.
kesempatan yang tidak terduga…
@honey : you’re welcome.. kalau butuh info apa lagi, aku coba bantu sebisanya.. teutep semangat ya, pantang menyerah! ^^
Tadi dah liat- liat info, beasiswa dalam waktu dekt kalo mau coba ke jepang maret 2008 baru buka pendaftaran untuk keberangkatan 2009, kerja dulu de, sambil coba apply taon depan hehe…Btw di japan nya ambil ap sis? O ya di Indonesianya asli mana, koq ono omongan jowo ne ki kadang2 🙂
salam kenal ya mbak…
dapet artikelnya dari kang yayan (titis wijayanto), mo minta ijin ngelink ke artikel ini, buat nambah info rekan-rekan yang sedang berusaha find a sensei juga ….
Arigato ne ..
Sunu Wibirama
Electrical Engineering Department
Gadjah Mada University
Yogyakarta, Indonesia
@Riadi : aku dah comment lsg ke blog kamu ya kemaren itu, hehe.. ama dah kirim email sehub dengan beasiswa, in case interested. 🙂
@Sunu : salam kenal juga..
ganbarou! dekiru kanarazu dekiru! semangat terus ya!
Monggo kalau mau di-link.. ^^
Are you still in Japan?It will nice for me to meet you.I am coming to Japan as a research student under the Monbukagakusho Scholarship
huhuhu, kenapa baru nemu blog ini sekarang ya TT
Setelah (sepertinya) gagal dengan ayf ..
btw, mau nanya dong. Waku itu aku pernah kontak ke prof, tapi dia malah ngasi suratku ke international office. Ternyata univnya gak bisa u to u, tapi harus monbusho yg g to g. Etis gak sih kalo aku email prof itu lagi? Tapi bingung harus omong apa. Thx ya sis, maaf jadi curhat begini… 🙂
btw, majorku dkv a.k.a desain grafis..
@Clement : thanks for dropping by. Yup we can catch up later.. Welcome to Japan! ^^
@Atri : Halo Atri, salam kenal.
Gpp kok kalo contact lagi ke senseinya asal dengan bahasa yang sopan. Terangin saja mengenai sistem g to g dan u to u itu.
Dengan tetap contact sensei, bisa buat referensi buat kamu ntar untuk apply scholarship lain misalnya. Yg penting sensei siap menerima kamu.
Good luck ya..
I want to join
[…] Learning in Japan I treat this posting as the sequel from Scholarship to Japan […]
and this what you are going to face
http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1033
[…] clearly, the last one… I didn’t understand what he said… sound mumbling… My friend said: Point 1) and 2) can be conducted parallely, so you can save the time to make your dream […]
hwwaaaa,,terima kasih kakak infonya..
saya juga kepengen banget ngelanjutin S2 ke jepang..
rencananya sih mau coba apply monbusho abis lulus kuliah nanti,hehe..
mau nanya kak,sebaiknya kita mulai kontak professor setelah mendapat beasiswa atau sebelum apply beasiswa??
buat tambahan saya jurusan teknik informatika kak.. 🙂
terima kasih sebelumnya
sama2.. 🙂 iya plan dari skrg nyari info beasiswa aja. Subscribe milis beasiswa juga.
Kalau sudah ada beasiswa, mungkin contact ke profesor lebih gampang, krn profesor menganggap kamu secara finansial sudah tidak masalah.
Namun, alangkah baiknya kalau bisa kontak professor sebelum mendapatkan beasiswa. Dengan bahasa yang sopan dan sampaikan kalau kamu sedang apply untuk beasiswa.
Jadi kalau sudah ada maintain contact, kamu ada poin plus di mata sponsor pas apply beasiswa.
good luck ya 🙂
siap…!!
terima kasih banyak ya kak..
hehehe.. 🙂
WAH KEBETULAN DAPAT NI ALAMAT….MINA TOLONG DONK KALO ADA YANG PUNYA KONTAK PROFESOR
SUSAH NIH…UADAH NYARI2 BELUM KETEMU….SDR ATRI MUNGKIN BISA BANTU SHARE INFONYA…..MAKASIH….TETAP BERUSAHA
SORRY…NYAMBUNG YANG DIATAS….BASE KU JG DKV ….THX
hai kakak,,
salam kenal
aku juga pengen nglanjtin s2 ke jepang
mnurut kakak itu susah mana cari professorny atw cari beasiswanya
klo aku baca blog2ny orang itu dibilangnya waktu kirim email ke profesorny itu ngirimin penelitian yang akan dilakuin disana , itu ntar dijepangny kita nglakuin penlitihan itu atw penlitihan profesornya?
Hi Vania, maap ya baru bales, pengalaman sih harusnya kalau dah dapet rekomendasi atau ada kontak dengan Prof sblm apply beasiswa, lebih gampang dapat beasiswanya.
Iya, kalau di Jepang sistemnya lebih ke research based soalnya.
Gut lak ya.