Men More Successful in 80 Pct of Medical Univ. Entrance Exams

September 5, 2018

Tokyo- Male applicants were more successful than female ones in medical department entrance exams for the six years through fiscal 2018 at 63 Japanese universities, or about 80 pct the total, preliminary results of a survey by the education ministry showed Tuesday.

The emergency nationwide survey followed a scandal in which Tokyo Medical University manipulated entrance exam results to curb the share of successful female applicants.

No other universities reported similar wrongdoings, according to the survey.

The ministry will release the final results of the survey next month after additional surveys, including visits to universities.

The survey, conducted in August, covered 81 universities with medical departments. It asked about the number of exam takers over the six years and successful applicants, as well as possible point additions for particular applicants and a possible difference in the selection of passers by gender or age.

According to the survey, the share of successful male applicants exceeded that of female ones for the current fiscal year from April at 57 universities, or 70 pct of the total. The proportion of successful male exam takers was higher than that of female ones for all past years covered by the survey, between fiscal 2013 and fiscal 2017, ranging from 57 pct to 71 pct of the total.

Successful male applicant rates were also higher for each year in all surveyed age groups--applicants aged 18 or younger, 19, 20, 21 and 22 or older.

Juntendo University had the highest combined rate of successful male applicants against that of female ones over the six years, at 1.67, followed by Showa University, at 1.54, Nihon University, at 1.49, and Kyushu University, at 1.43.

The combined rate of men against that of women exceeded one at 63 universities, or 78 pct of the total. At 19 of them, men's rate was higher than women's for each of the six years.

By contrast, Hirosaki University had the lowest such combined rate, at 0.75, followed by Gifu University, at 0.84, and Tokushima University, at 0.87.

At Tokyo Medical University, the share of successful male applicants for its entrance exam for the current fiscal year stood at 9 pct of the total and that of female ones at 3 pct. Successful female applicants stood at 6 pct for the preceding year, higher than 5 pct of male applicants.

The proportion of male and female successful applicants was equal for fiscal 2013 and fiscal 2015 at the university. The school's combined rate of successful male applicants against female ones over the six years was 1.29.

It is difficult to find other departments in which the share of successful male applicants is higher than that of female ones, said Taizo Yamada, head of the ministry's Office for University Entrance Examinations.

The share of successful female applicants is usually higher in science and humanities departments, Yamada said. Jiji Press