Schools buck coed trend to remain as women's universities in Japan

NAGOYA - Amid a nationwide shift in which women's universities in Japan are either going coeducational or closing due to the country's shrinking student population, one school in Nagoya declared earlier this year that it will remain women-only, arguing that such institutions are still necessary.

"(Women's universities) foster students to become people who can overcome the invisible hurdles that exist in society," Yasuo Sugiyama, chairman of Sugiyama Jogakuen University, said in an interview in June.