Chōsen gakkō

History

The schools were established by Koreans who came to Japan to earn much more money during the pre-World War II period and during the war. Historically the North Korean government and the Chongryon provided funding for the North Korean schools in Japan. Justin McCurry of The Guardian stated that politically conservative Japanese people opposed the schools because since they believed that "a group that blatantly proclaims its loyalty to an unfriendly regime" should not receive the same treatment as the traditional Japanese education system.

The schools received increasing support in the 1950s and 1960s since many Koreans in Japan sided with the Chongryon; at the time North Korea appeared to have good economic prospects.

Beginning in 2010 and by 2014 increasing tensions between the Japanese and North Korean governments caused Japanese cities and prefectures to end subsidies to North Korean schools. In the fiscal year of 2011 the Osaka Prefectural Government ended subsidies to a North Korean educational corporation which operates ten schools.

The Japanese central government also took measures against the schools. In 2010 it prevented North Korean high schools from being a part of a tuition free waiver program. In February 2013 the Japanese central government, citing the development of the North Korean nuclear program and a lack of cooperation regarding the North Korean abductions of Japanese citizens, officially declared that North Korean schools may not be a part of the tuition waiver program.

The January 2013 passage of United Nations Security Council Resolution 2087, which increased sanctions against North Korea, caused North Korean government support for the schools to erode.

By 2014 the loss of funding put many North Korean schools in financial peril.

Operations

In 2014 Institute of Contemporary Asian Studies at Temple University in Tokyo director Robert Dujarric stated that the North Korean government uses the North Korea-aligned schools as a means to propagandize, and Takushoku University professor Hideshi Takesada stated that the schools teach obedience to Kim Jong-un and uses "very ideological" curriculum.

As of 2013 many schools use their own curriculum distinct from that of North Korean curriculum. The schools' teachers generally write their own textbooks.

Around 2003 many North Korean primary and junior high schools removed portraits of the Kim Il-sung family from the classrooms due to a belief that such portraits were not appropriate for small children. In 2014 Kim Chol, the principal of a Chongryon elementary school in Ikuno-ku, Osaka, stated that most North Korean-aligned schools in Japan no longer display portraits of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il since the schools wanted to attract more students and because many parents had different political ideas.