Japan Visa Limits Unfair, U.S. Schools Say : Education: University officials ask Tokyo to relax restrictions on American students to redress imbalance.

TOKYO —  Detroit native Heather Sullivan, 19, imagined Japan as a nation of kimono-clad women, high-tech gizmos, deeply held Buddhism and standoffish people.

But in her year here at Temple University’s Japanese campus, she has learned that nearly everyone wears suits and skirts, that some low-tech train stations still collect tickets by hand, that relatively few Japanese seriously practice a religion and that people are friendlier than she’d thought.

Fellow Temple student Reiko Murakami, 21, of Nara, Japan, has been startled by the independence and diligence of American college students, as well as by the U.S. academic style of challenging professors. In Japan, getting into college is far more rigorous than actually attending, and professors are often deferred to almost as gods.

U.S.-Japanese student exchanges--helping the economically entwined but culturally distant peoples learn firsthand about each other--would seem as non-controversial as Mom, apple pie and Mt. Fuji. But in what some view as a brewing bilateral trade dispute, U.S. officials are appealing to the Japanese government to redress an imbalance in academic exchange and grant more student visas to Americans.

Just as interest in Japan among young Americans is soaring--Japanese is now the fastest-growing foreign language in U.S. high schools--restrictive laws, compounded by a 1991 immigration crackdown, have made it extremely difficult for all but those choosing to study at Japanese universities to obtain student visas.

In 1991, the Japanese government granted 1,428 student visas to Americans, according to Justice Ministry figures. In contrast, the U.S. government granted 34,657 five-year student visas to Japanese between October, 1991, and September, 1992--including those applying to Japanese institutions in the United States. Both figures include visas for high school students.

That discrepancy, some Americans argue, amounts to the same kind of closed market and unfair trade that has fired disputes over semiconductors, autos and other business sectors. One reason for the resistance, some U.S. officials suggest, may be Japanese educators’ fears of competition for a shrinking pool of college-age students if it becomes easier for American universities to operate here.

“We feel there are real inequities and are beginning to view this as a trade issue,” said William Sharp, dean of Temple University’s branch campus in the Tokyo suburb of Hachioji. “We are at a tremendous competitive disadvantage because few of our students can come here to study.”

Japanese officials, however, say that student visas generally are granted only to applicants at recognized Japanese universities--and that Americans should adapt to that system like everyone else.

Indeed, Americans who apply to study at Japanese universities generally face no problem obtaining student visas. At issue is the growing number of American students who are choosing to spend a semester or year at the Japanese campuses of American universities, which have grown to more than 15 in the last decade.

Although these campuses are primarily aimed at Japanese students wanting to study in a U.S. academic environment, the booming interest in Japan among Americans has prompted educators to recruit more from home.

The U.S. Embassy in Tokyo estimates that several hundred more Americans would come to study at U.S. universities’ branch campuses in Japan in the next 12 to 18 months if there were no visa problems, and the number could reach 1,000 over several years.

Because Japanese authorities do not recognize the branch campuses as bona fide universities, most students come without a visa and must leave the country in 90 days, are denied student discounts on rail passes and are generally prohibited from working even part time.

“When they were setting up their programs, they never consulted us or the local areas to see what the requirements were,” said Toshio Yasuma, an Education Ministry official. “They went off and took their own path.”

Education Minister Mayumi Moriyama, in a recent meeting with U.S. Ambassador Michael H. Armacost, minced no words in telling him that Americans should adapt to Japanese rules, according to Education Ministry official Kiyoji Ichikawa, who was present.

Moriyama also invited U.S. campuses to become Japanese institutions, thereby allowing their students to qualify for visas. But U.S. educators say that option is impractical given the enormous capital investment required and detailed rules that range from the size and type of classrooms and offices to the curriculum content.

U.S. educators also argue that they were invited to Japan by various prefectures or Japanese corporations and that Japan should use this chance to help address its legitimate complaint that few Americans study its language or culture.

Armacost declined to comment on the meeting. He said he personally did not regard the dispute as a trade issue, however, and stressed that “both governments want to encourage an expansion of student exchanges.”

But Sharp and other educators, having exhausted diplomatic and bureaucratic channels, have launched political lobbying efforts and appealed to Speaker of the House Thomas S. Foley (D-Wash.) and House Majority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.), as well as to other congressional representatives.

Bereft of a clear ruling on the issue, each university has been consigned to cutting the best individual deal it can. After working on the issue for more than 10 years, Philadelphia-based Temple has managed to land a compromise of a few dozen “cultural visas” per year, good for six months and allowing students limited work opportunities. But officials say that is an inappropriate visa and an inadequate number for their needs, adding that ideally they would like at least 200 student visas a year.

The Minnesota state university system, which has 54 Americans studying here, has worked out a complicated routine whereby student visas are obtained through the Japanese Consulate in Chicago, the students are refused entry at Narita Airport and the university then appeals the ruling--and wins.

One thing in the Minnesota system’s favor, according to Yukiko Suda, director of administrative services, is that its Japanese partner is the city of Yuwa in Akita prefecture, rather than one of the Japanese corporations that are paired with other American universities.

Operating out of Hiroshima, the Lehman College of City University of New York, meanwhile, has simply resigned itself to the 90-day time limit for all foreigners without special visas. The college routinely plans a field trip to South Korea midway through its semester in Japan in order to renew its students’ status.

Educators fear, however, that their separate deals could be canceled at any time, and they want a more permanent status.

“I think we’d like a clean policy--(otherwise) lots of people get left out in the cold,” a U.S. official said. “If a student is a student and a school is a school, let’s call (them) what they are.”

Visa fraud was one reason the Japanese tightened their immigration law in 1991. A wave of foreigners, particularly from Southeast Asia, were using student visas as a pretext to come to Japan to work--a problem that does not apply to Americans, educators say.

The dispute stems from two disparate histories, geographies and academic systems. Japan maintained an official policy of isolation for 300 years, letting few foreigners in. But after U.S. warships forced Japan to open up in 1854, the island nation began sending out scores of scholars to the West to soak up knowledge and bring it home.

The United States, in contrast, “has a long history of being an underpopulated, enormous country, and we welcome people in,” a U.S. official said.

As one result, U.S. institutions tend to be more open. Even Japanese-operated universities in the United States, for instance, can obtain student visas as long as their credits are accepted by three other accredited institutions--a requirement that has been fulfilled, for instance, by the Teikyo University system.

Nearly lost in the debate are the students at American branches in Japan, who say they would like a better balance between Japanese and Americans on campus.

“I was expecting more communication in English, but most of the students here are Japanese,” said Meimi Ushida, a Temple student in social welfare. “I was very disappointed.”

For now, no resolution appears in sight.

“We’ve been trying to do this privately, nicely and quietly for 10 years--and getting nowhere,” Sharp said.

Megumi Shimizu, a researcher in The Times’ Tokyo Bureau, contributed to this report.