Private Academies of Chinese Learning in Meiji Japan: The Decline ...

198 PRIVATE ACADEMIES OF CHINESE LEARNING IN MEIJI JAPANwas little conception of formal education being important forsuccess, especially if the family was wealthy. Farmers’ sons whodid go to school beyond elementary level were commonlyyounger sons from families who could afford to send them awayor who had impressed their teachers by their exceptional ability.Merchant families usually preferred their children to becomeapprentices after receiving elementary education. 75 Women’sschooling beyond elementary school was not seen as importantat all.The number of professions for which schooling was anecessary condition was at first limited to posts in government,the law, medicine and teaching. These required passingexaminations but not neces sarily attending certain schools. 76One decisive step, however, did make attending the prescribedschools the only way to advancement (gakureki shakai). This wasthe system of privileging graduates of certain (usually state)schools by exempting them from civil service and professionalexaminations and allowing them a shorter period in the conscriptarmy. From the introduction of civil service examinations in 1887until 1893 only graduates of Tokyo Imperial University wereexempt. Since the quota of civil servants was usually filled withprivileged graduates, pupils who attended private schools hadlittle chance of becoming civil servants. Even after 1893university graduates were exempt from the first part of the twopartexamination. Privileges relating to the examinations fordoctors, lawyers, pharmacists and middle school teacherscontinued even after they were abolished for the civil serviceexaminations. Some private schools managed to secure privilegesfor their graduates by meeting certain conditions imposed by thegovernment. But the result of this system was that places at stateschools were more desirable and state schools had more prestige.Theoretically, it was still possible to pass the professionalexaminations without formal schooling. As late as 1904, 39 percent of all middle school teachers had no formal qualifications atall and only half of the rest had gone through the school system,the others having passed examinations. 77 Between the late 1890sand the early 1910s the private specialist schools catered for thoseattempting the self-study route by publishing lecture notes(kōgiroku; there was still a dearth of textbooks for the modernsubjects) and offering distance learning. 78 But here too optionswere narrowing as competition for the examinations increased,