"A Chronicle of Repeating a Year at Tokyo University of Science

—A path meant for science, derailed by confusion and laziness

Having devoted his youth to entrance exams, he entered Tokyo University of Science as a backup choice. Yet what awaited him there was a student life marked by mental stagnation and inertia. He neglected lab reports, exploited the resubmission system to scrape by with credits, and relied on the cooperative dormitory environment to survive his first year. In his second year, he became isolated at the Katsushika campus and endured the emptiness of commuting. He approached specialized subjects with a careless attitude, failed many required courses, but barely managed to advance.

In his third year, he struggled to balance retaking courses and conducting experiments. A single instance of tardiness proved fatal, resulting in his repeating the year. A mishap in the research building and the sternness of professors further crushed his spirit. After being held back, he escaped into club activities while reevaluating his compatibility with his major, eventually beginning to seriously consider graduate school.

This chronicle is a bitter yet sincere record of a young man who was supposed to walk the path of a scientist, but was tossed about by laziness and lack of planning, gradually searching for the direction he ought to take.

Chronicle of Repeating a Year at Tokyo University of Science

Although it’s not Keio University, Tokyo University of Science is also known as a university where students often fail—about 20% of students repeat a year annually. By chance, I got to know a student who had repeated a year at Tokyo University of Science, and had the opportunity to publish their written account here.

I didn’t take my lab reports seriously, and a single late arrival became a fatal blow that prevented me from advancing to my fourth year.

spent my youth entirely on studying for entrance exams, without knowing what I wanted to do or even how to have fun. In the end, I barely made it into Tokyo University of Science through a waitlist admission.
(Note: In Japan, science-track students typically aim for the University of Tokyo. If they don’t get in, they apply to other science-focused universities as backups. Tokyo University of Science is one of the top private science universities, but some students, like the author, enroll reluctantly.)

I had never seriously thought about my future. Being able to shift the burden of my existence onto the problem sets in front of me was, in a way, the most comfortable state—one that kept me far from any real thinking. I didn’t make it into my first-choice university, but I also didn’t have the energy left to take a gap year and try again.
(Note: In Japan, taking a “ronin” year means postponing university entrance to study for another year and reapply.)

Given all that, it’s no surprise that someone so fundamentally unmotivated and thoughtless would fall into a state of emptiness the moment they got into university.

First Year

In my first year at university, I managed to get through life relatively smoothly. I was enrolled in the Faculty of Basic Engineering (as it was called at the time), and all first-year students were required to live in dormitories at the Oshamambe campus in Hokkaido — a rural area in Japan’s northernmost region. This setup lowered the barrier to making friends, and since there were few academic divisions or elective differences in the first year, I could easily collaborate with friends on the same dormitory floor. The dorms were located on campus, so it only took three minutes to get from my room to the classroom. These favorable conditions helped me advance to the next year.

The university operated on a quarter system, meaning exam periods were relatively short. To streamline common lectures, students were split into groups and rotated through the same content in the first and second halves of each semester. This created a culture of group test preparation among friends, which also worked in my favor.

However, even then, signs of trouble were already showing. I had no intention of meeting lab report deadlines. I took the university’s anti-plagiarism policy too seriously and unconsciously rejected the idea of using past reports or asking friends for help. Normally, students are divided into lab groups and rotate through experiments, so it’s common to have access to past reports from classmates. Naturally, my efficiency suffered.

In desperation, I underestimated and exploited the resubmission system. I would submit a garbage report by the deadline, get it sent back for revision, and use that as a way to effectively extend the deadline. Of course, my grades were terrible, but since failing to submit was defined as an automatic fail, I still managed to earn the credits. As planned, I got the credits — just barely.

(Side Note: Oshamambe Detention)

Even if you fail your first year, you can still transfer to the Katsushika campus in Tokyo the following year. There, you retake first-year classes exclusively with other students who have repeated the year. This means that at Katsushika, there are only a handful of first-year students in the Faculty of Basic Engineering — all of whom are repeaters.

Occasionally, when retaking a course (which is essentially a different experience due to the change in campus and instructors), you might run into former classmates. I also retook some classes this way.

Since I often get asked by my high school friends whether failing means being “detained” in Oshamambe for another year, I’ll clarify here: no, you move on to Tokyo.

Second Year

After barely advancing from my first year, I began commuting to the Katsushika campus in Tokyo. I rejoined a new club and started enjoying student life again, but this was also when I had to pay the price for the thoughtless way I had spent the previous year.

Specifically, commuting from my parents’ home took over an hour and a half each way, and most of the close friends I had made in the dorms during my first year—friends I could rely on for last-minute study sessions—were all in different departments. Fortunately, I had a smart and friendly classmate in my own department who would lend me notes, but we weren’t close enough to study together the way I had done with my dorm friends in first year.

Since I had no place to stay near campus, I had to return home every day, even during exam periods, staring blankly into space on the long ride back. Wasting precious time right before exams was painful, and the three-hour round trip became a daily routine. I even developed the ability to sleep standing up while holding onto the train’s hand straps. Now that I work in a car-dependent rural area, that skill has no use—and no one around me seems to appreciate it either.

Then came the real problem: in the first quarter of my second year, when departments split and specialized lectures began, I failed 80% of my required courses. There’s no excuse—I had completely underestimated the difficulty of the lectures. Fortunately (or perhaps unfortunately), since it was only one quarter’s worth of credits, I calculated that if I retook everything in my third year, I could still avoid repeating the year. But this foolish slacker—me—wouldn’t truly reflect on his actions until much later.

(Side Note: Second-Year Experiments)

I somehow managed to advance to my third year, but by then I had earned a bit of a reputation. In the lab classes during my second and third years, the deadline for submitting reports was the feedback session held three days after the experiment. I couldn’t be bothered with the three-day limit, so I fully exploited the resubmission system to scrape together credits.

Out of a misplaced sense of pride, I refused to refer to past reports submitted by others. As a result, I often missed the key points that the teaching assistants had specifically told us to address. It felt like I was getting credits simply for submitting something—anything. Once, I wrote something so off-base that it piqued the assistant professor’s curiosity. He started explaining, “Well, normally this would be… wait, why does it work this way? I’m not sure myself. Okay! For your resubmission, include a detailed analysis of this part too. Let’s figure it out together!” And just like that, I was given a spontaneous extra assignment I couldn’t rely on anyone else to help with.

My strange sense of honesty—refusing to use past reports—backfired especially hard in lab courses. Just before summer break, we had a poster presentation event where we had to summarize our experiment and demonstrate our understanding. It was also a chance for professors to critique our poster-writing skills. I was paired with another student who had repeated a year, and he suggested, “This doesn’t count toward credits, so let’s skip it.” I couldn’t bring myself to go along, so I ended up presenting alone.

I didn’t expect him to actually skip it, and I only started preparing a week before the event. In my rush, I forgot to include my student ID and name on the poster—despite it being clearly stated as a requirement. I ended up scribbling them in with a marker right before the presentation. I figured it was better than leaving them out entirely, but apparently it looked so odd that I became known among the professors as “the handwritten guy.”

After I graduated, the department—perhaps influenced by COVID—implemented a new rule requiring posters to be submitted as printed materials with ample lead time. Honestly, it might have been better if I hadn’t shown up at all.

Third Year

In the latter half of my second year, I managed to avoid any fatal course failures and advanced to the third year. In my department, failing meant repeating the third year entirely rather than moving on to the fourth year. If I could clear the leftover credits from second year and survive third year without slipping, I’d be able to graduate on time.

There was also a separate requirement: scoring at least 400 on the TOEIC. Luckily, I had already met this during the group test held right after admission. It’s hard to believe, but apparently every year there are students who fail to meet this requirement, which made me realize just how much I had relied on physics and chemistry alone to get through entrance exams.

In the second quarter of my third year, I had to retake a required chemistry course while also juggling third-year lab work. It was a tough schedule, so I prepared thoroughly. In the end, I passed the chemistry course. The problem was the lab.

My lab grade for third year came back as a D. Even though I had abused the resubmission system, I had submitted everything—at least I thought I had.

Upon investigation, I learned that the resubmission system was calculated right at the edge of credit eligibility. If there was even a single deduction unrelated to content—like a late arrival—it could result in an automatic fail.

And I had been late once. I got lost in the research building on the way to the feedback session. The classroom for feedback was separate from the lab, and the building’s interior was symmetrically designed. In the central area of the floor, there were three large rooms, two of which were divided by partitions for different lab groups. None of the rooms had nameplates, and my natural lack of direction led me to wander aimlessly through the floor.

I ended up walking into a room full of unrelated graduate students, which was deeply embarrassing. Apparently, the deduction for that tardiness was significant. To make matters worse, the person in charge wasn’t a TA (a graduate student who assists with lab classes), but a strict professor. I had seen this professor reject a student’s official delay certificate, saying, “There’s no attendance-based bonus, so you’d be better off studying on your own.”

And so, my fate was sealed: I had to repeat the year.

(Side Note: Getting Lost)

Even after being assigned to a research lab, I continued getting lost in the research building.

The names of the rooms used by graduate students out of habit didn’t match the outdated signs posted on the walls, so I ended up going to the wrong room when I was called. The building’s symmetrical layout, combined with the lack of a proper map, still leaves me feeling frustrated.

Repeating a Year

When I told my parents that I had to repeat a year, they took it seriously.

They didn’t scold me for the fact of repeating itself. However, my father told me that the disadvantages of the university environment—like the long commute—and the fact that I ended up repeating a year were consequences of the choices I had made when selecting the university. My mother, on the other hand, was frighteningly empathetic, doing everything she could to keep me from falling into despair.

I had always thought I inherited her emotional resilience, but seeing how deeply she cared made me realize how fortunate I was to have such parents.

Since I had already earned credits for all the required lectures, during my repeat year I only had to attend lab classes. There were a few elective adjustments, but they were minor.

I might have been able to change things if I had humbled myself and pleaded with the faculty committee, but I didn’t even try. Maybe it would’ve been pointless since grades were already finalized, but the fact that I didn’t even attempt it was probably due to my own fragile pride.

During my repeat year, I didn’t have much to do, so I focused on club activities. I didn’t take on a part-time job, nor did I enroll in year-long courses that regular students often skip due to required classes. Looking back, I realize I wasted a valuable opportunity.

The one positive outcome of repeating the year was that it forced me to reconsider the compatibility between my department and what I actually wanted to do. It made me seriously think about applying to graduate school.

In summary, my failure to fully commit to things I didn’t care about—born from a fundamentally lazy nature—was what led to me repeating the year.

To Those Who Have Repeated a Year: Reflections and Regrets

Here’s what I want to share with others who have experienced repeating a year, along with the regrets I personally carry.

The additional tuition required isn’t cheap, but compared to the lifelong investment your parents have made in you, it’s a relatively small amount. Rather than stressing over how to cover or repay it immediately, it’s better to focus on graduating first and then think about how to return that investment. Worrying endlessly over an extra one or two million yen at this point is, frankly, misplaced.

That said, since it is an investment, you need to produce results and mark a clear milestone. I recommend discussing your goals with your parents and those around you. Being completely unplanned isn’t ideal, but sometimes a new perspective only comes after you’ve accepted your situation.

One of my biggest regrets is not being more proactive in seeking outside stimulation during my repeat year. I could have done so many things that only university students can do—like sitting in on unfamiliar lectures, getting off at random stations within my commuter pass range to explore the area, using student discounts to visit museums and galleries, or going on long trips. I even considered spending time in the university library to study without worrying about credits.

Sometimes, just passing by familiar faces can reveal things you hadn’t noticed before.