An advisory panel to the ministry in charge of education has compiled a report recommending that compulsory English education be started in the 5th grade at all elementary schools.
The government has recommended local administrations set up a fund to help yjose senior high school students who have become unable to continue receiving education because of financial problems of their parents.
The education ministry appointed some of Japan's Nobel Prize laureates as members of a new panel, which is assigned to come up with plans to promote research and education in basic science.