Japan's efforts to support kids with foreign backgrounds

One of the questions I'm sometimes asked from friends and family back home is whether my kids have ever been bullied here because they are not Japanese. Thankfully, that hasn't been our experience so far. Overall, my children have been treated kindly at school, and I'm grateful for the teachers and classmates who have made them feel welcome. I'm also hoping it will stay that way as they get older! Still, I can understand why bullying and discrimination can be a very real issue for other foreign children here.

A recent seminar highlighted the issue, with around 200 teachers and educators joining an online event focused on protecting children with foreign roots from discrimination. Experts shared findings that many adults with international backgrounds still carry trauma from being taunted or excluded as students, and I thought that was a really interesting point -- I think often as we get older we still have a lot of those childhood wounds. One speaker stressed that when children make comments about someone "not being Japanese," adults have to step in clearly and firmly to stamp that behavior out right away.

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The seminar also emphasized that children often pick up discriminatory attitudes by imitating what they see from adults, which I didn't think was any real surprise. Organizers of the seminar urged teachers and parents to remind students who have been bullied that they are not alone, and to model inclusive behavior themselves.

I thought it was reassuring to see educators and advocates working to address these issues openly, because every child deserves to feel safe and included at school, irrespective of where their families are originally from!