Enjoy this short video snippet about Rugby School Japan from our 2025 Tokyo Expo.
Transcript
We spoke with Anthony Gardner (Relationship Development and Admissions Manager).
ISTimes Global: (00:00) Hello, we’re here with
Rugby School Japan (Anthony): (00:02) Anthony
ISTimes Global: (00:03) at the Rugby School Japan booth at the Expo. Anthony, welcome.
Rugby School Japan (Anthony): (00:07) Thank you very much. Yeah.
School History
ISTimes Global: (00:09) Could you tell us a bit about the history of your school?
Rugby School Japan (Anthony): (00:13) Okay, so Rugby School Japan, it’s a sister school of the Rugby School, the famous Rugby private school in the UK, which has, you know, almost 500 years of history. And we opened in 2023. So there are only two other sister schools. There’s Rugby School Thailand, Rugby School Japan. Um, we are 30 minutes uh from Central Tokyo, uh in Kashiwa Noha campus station. Um, we are a boarding school but also a day school. So it’s about 50% borders, 50% day pupils. And um, it’s a British curriculum. So age 11 to 18. Age 16, the students will take uh GCSE courses, age 18, they do A levels. And uh, yeah, so the students uh will then go on to top universities.
ISTimes Global: (01:07) Sounds great.
Rugby School Japan (Anthony): (01:08) Thank you.
Academic Life
ISTimes Global: (01:09) Can you tell us a bit about academics at your school or any special programs that you have?
Rugby School Japan (Anthony): (01:14) Yeah, so, well, like I mentioned, being being the British curriculum, uh, we we focus on A levels uh which are age 16 to 18, so that would be year 12, year 13. And we believe like the A levels is a great pathway to go into university because A levels means you’re studying three or four subjects that are dear to you and you can really focus on those subjects. And then uh that’s a great stepping stone to the university of choice. Also, on top of that, we offer what we call the EPQ, the extended project qualification, where a student can really focus on something that uh is close to them like uh could be a research project, like a dissertation, or if they’re into art, it they could be designing something or making some sort of art. And that’s almost like, it’s like a kind of mini university experience, which looks very good for a student to then go on to university or their future job. Um, and um another advantage of our school and very important for us is small class sizes. So we we make sure there’s a limit on the number of students and there’s uh constant uh tailor-made care for each student through the boarding houses, through the tutor system we have, or in the classroom itself.
Extracurricular Activities
ISTimes Global: (02:40) Okay. Nice. Can you tell me a little bit about uh how students at your school get involved in the community outside of academics? So like the extracurricular sorts of things.
Rugby School Japan (Anthony): (02:51) Okay, great. Yeah. So what we call it uh co-curricular program, which is so each day the students will have their, you know, normal lessons, of course. And then every student has to do a co-curricular uh activity or course each day, Monday to Friday. Uh and they can choose. So it could be something different every day or maybe two or three different things a week from sports, drama, debate, science club, uh, you know, technology club, could be anything. We offer over 80 different activities that they do. Um, and some of these will involve going outside of the campus, of course, and mixing with the community. Um, where we’re located is uh Kashiwa Noha campus, which is uh smart city. So, we’re on the same area as uh one of the campuses of Tokyo University, also Chiba University. So we make sure we have a strong relationship with them. We often have uh uh business people and entrepreneurs come to the school and do activities with our students. Um, also professors, visiting professors from Tokyo University. Um, and another example would be the computer club, they uh visited the Google head office in Tokyo and met the CEO and uh they were talking about uh, you know, how uh especially how women can get into this kind of engineering uh positions that Google offers. So there’s a lot of activities with the community and like co-curricular activities that we do because that’s extremely important for our school. Not just the academics, it’s all about other developments. Yeah.
Day in the Life at Rugby School Japan
ISTimes Global: (04:38) Sounds amazing. Um can you give us an idea of what a day in the life at the Rugby school is like? Like these all sound like amazing programs, but like what’s the day-to-day at the school like?
Rugby School Japan (Anthony): (04:49) Yeah. Well, it it would depend on if you’re boarding or if you’re a day pupil. So let let’s start with the boarder. So they live in uh houses. We have six boarding houses, three for boys, three for girls. Um, where the rooms you you’d be sharing a room with, depending on your age, it could be up to four students, sometimes just two or if you’re doing A levels, it might just be uh a single room that you’ve got. Um, so you’d get up, there’s kind of roll call, uh and then uh breakfast. Then after that, lessons would would start from about 8:30 every day. Um, three lessons and then a break where you go into your boarding house and have a healthy snack, talk to your friends, talk to your housemates. Um, two more lessons before lunch, and then uh two lessons in the afternoon followed by when we do the co-curricular activities. So there’ll be a lot of sport or whatever they’re choosing to do, music, drama, anything like that. Um, and um the school day basically finishes at 5:30. That’s when the day pupils would then go home. So their day is like eight, basically 8:15 to 5:30. Okay. Uh the borders would then have a bit of spare time, dinner, they have a chance to actually go off the campus. Um, and surrounding our campus, we’ve got lovely parks and also a massive shopping, LaLa Port shopping center. So there’s plenty to do for the students. Um, and then they would come back and in the evening for the borders, they have uh what we call prep, which is basically homework, but with the teachers. So they get this structured study that you have with our teach uh the tutors there because that each house has three uh adult staff living there. So the house master or house mistress, the assistant, also the house assistant which helps them with any emotional issues they might have or uh logistical issues. So there’s this huge community that they have, which is very important. It’s very different from a Japanese boarding school which, you know, the say system which maybe it’s just somewhere to sleep, you know, but ours is it’s a community, a lot of communication, 100%, 24/7 support from, you know, medical team as well and that the house team. So it’s a great atmosphere for young people to become young adults. Yes.
ISTimes Global: (07:20) That sounded amazing. Thank you very much.
Rugby School Japan (Anthony): (07:22) Yeah, you’re welcome. Thanks a lot.
About Rugby School Japan
- British-style boarding/day school in Japan, founded 1 year ago
- 50% boarding students, 50% day students (current enrollment ~230)
- Four boarding houses (2 girls, 2 boys) with house system
- Holistic education focusing on character development
- Strong partnerships with University of Tokyo and Chiba University
- Plans to grow to 760 students with selective admissions
- First graduating class applying to top global universities (Oxford, LSE, Yale, etc.)
- Unique Japanese partnerships with companies like Google
- Based on Rugby School UK’s 450+ year heritage
- Located near University of Tokyo campus
- Focus on developing brave, confident graduates
