QUOTE(Mutton123 @ Jun 13 2014, 12:05 AM)
Hi everyone.
Went through the whole thread. I myself have applied for a Japanese Language school starting in Oct 2014 and uh .. maybe you kind people can offer me advice or clarify me on my concerns below? :-
- I don't know if I should ask this here but, I wonder how long does the screening process take? I have submitted necessary documents and etc to the school through a local agent since April but so far there is no reply at all (I have contact the agency and no! Nothing.). Any of you could share personal experiences like how long did it took to get your cert of eligibility or etc?
- EJU. I personally thinks that this is the test that people who wanted to pursue studies in university takes. And I did not actually see anyone who talked about Vocational college or Professional traning college or technical school - " senmon gakkou " in detail here. Is EJU required in order to get admitted? I have go through some several websites, most of 'em mentioned that either you need to complete 12 years of formal studies and pass JLPT N2 or above and you can get in, but they do mentioned about EJU though... any of you attend these schools (senmon gakkou) may share your personal experience?
- Scholarships. Let's say I have completed my University Preparatory Course and obtained very good academic results and attendence is acceptable and I am about to further my studies in some technical school. How does this go about? Like I can request scholarship from the school or Japanese government do have scholarship programmes for foreigner? What kind do they have? How do they distribute?
- Place to stay. Seems that the school that I am going to attend does not have a dorminity so, any recommendation? Independant student dorm? Any problems? Like if you are going to work please come back before 11pm or so taht kinda place or maybe just apartments? Very big problem here coz those websites I looked into is like you need to search based on the prefecture or according to train stations and I have researched the japanese rails. Honestly, the map for the rail is like ....

.... Not like LRT in KL. Ampang line or Kelana Jaya line only. mMust have been 10 or 20 kinds of line. Any advice?
Your advice will be greatly appreciated!
Regards,
It's almost October and I'm not sure if I'm of much help now but I'll try to answer some of your questions!!
QUOTE
I don't know if I should ask this here but, I wonder how long does the screening process take? I have submitted necessary documents and etc to the school through a local agent since April but so far there is no reply at all (I have contact the agency and no! Nothing.). Any of you could share personal experiences like how long did it took to get your cert of eligibility or etc?
When I applied for the language school I'm attending now they provided me with a lot of guidance and specific instructions via e-mail. I got my visa and COE after about 2 months, I think.
QUOTE
- EJU. I personally thinks that this is the test that people who wanted to pursue studies in university takes. And I did not actually see anyone who talked about Vocational college or Professional traning college or technical school - " senmon gakkou " in detail here. Is EJU required in order to get admitted? I have go through some several websites, most of 'em mentioned that either you need to complete 12 years of formal studies and pass JLPT N2 or above and you can get in, but they do mentioned about EJU though... any of you attend these schools (senmon gakkou) may share your personal experience?
For "senmon gakkou" they normally do NOT need EJU and they will only look at your JLPT level. Most senmon gakkous require a minimum of N2. All my friends who are aiming for senmon gakkou are not taking EJU. Since we started school in April, they took N2 in July and are probably planning to take N1 this December.
QUOTE
- Place to stay. Seems that the school that I am going to attend does not have a dorminity so, any recommendation? Independant student dorm? Any problems? Like if you are going to work please come back before 11pm or so taht kinda place or maybe just apartments? Very big problem here coz those websites I looked into is like you need to search based on the prefecture or according to train stations and I have researched the japanese rails. Honestly, the map for the rail is like ....

.... Not like LRT in KL. Ampang line or Kelana Jaya line only. mMust have been 10 or 20 kinds of line. Any advice?
I'm staying with my school's dormitory now, which is literally 2 minutes walking distance away from my school and the area is pretty safe. I'm not sure about other schools, but my school's dormitory does not have a curfew. You can find apartments via agencies (I think my friends went through an agency called SUUMO, not sure if that's the right spelling though!) and most apartments/mansions are about 50,000yen a month not including electricity+water if you're staying alone. Note that apartments in Tokyo are pretty squeezy, so don't be surprised by the size.
If you're going to study in Tokyo, there are a gazillion train lines but after a while you'll get used to it. Just have a good map with you and download the train app into your iPhone/android and you should be fine! It should be the same for other prefectures as well. The last trains are normally around 12~1, but there are some last trains that go past that time too. Earliest trains of the day start at around 4~5am.
A good idea when finding a place to live is to make sure of the distance and number of changes you have to make on the train to get from your house to school and back. Another good idea would be to choose an area to live that's on the same train line as your school.
Unfortunately, I can't answer much about scholarships because I have no idea about that either.

Would be glad if anyone could enlighten me on that though!
Hope you have a fun time studying in Japan!