TranSenz: MEXT Scholarship and Visa Information for Moving to Japan
Field of study and research program plan: mext faq.
Need help with your Field of Study and Research Program Plan? How to Write a Scholarship-Winning Field of Study and Research Program Plan will walk you through choosing a field, developing a research question, and completing the final report to give you the best chance of success!
Here are the questions:
Is a Field of Study and Research Program Plan required if I want to apply for a taught Master’s instead of a research Masters?
All Masters degrees in Japan require research (and most require coursework, as well), so, yes.
What applicants have to fill out a Field of Study and Research Program Plan?
All graduate-level applicants, regardless of whether you are applying to be a research student, Master’s student, or PhD student.
How long should the Field of Study and Research Program Plan be?
The form is two pages, so that’s a good target. I have a detailed template, including length requirements for each section available here !
If you have graphs, tables, diagrams, etc. that are absolutely necessary, then it can go a little longer, but I would still try to keep it within 3 pages.
Your list or references does not count toward the page limits mentioned above.
Should I write my Field of Study and Research Program Plan in English or Japanese?
You should write it in the language that you intend to write your thesis in.
What should the Field of Study and Research Program Plan include?
I have published a detailed Field of Study and Research Program Plan template in another article, so please review that for details!
Is the “Present Field of Study” (Embassy-Recommended Application Process) what I studied in my last degree, or what I hope to study in Japan?
It’s your subject from your last degree. Your field of study in Japan should build out of your past studies, so use this section of the form to connect the two.
Does the Research Program Plan need to include a timeline?
How long of a time should my research program plan timeline cover.
Two years for a Master’s, three years for a PhD, and the length of time you intend to stay in Japan as a research student if you’re applying for just that status (up to 1.5 years)
Even if your program has you doing coursework for the first year and focusing on your thesis research in your second year, your plan should cover two years. Of course, your plan should take that focus into account!
If I’m applying to be a research student for a year and then continue into a Master’s degree, should my research program plan cover two years or three?
It depends on why you want to apply to be a research student first.
If you want to research one subject as a research student then another as a Master’s student, then you would write your initial research plan for just the research student year.
If you are applying for research student status because you cannot enter the degree program directly at your chosen university (e.g. it starts in a different semester), then write your research plan for the entire intended duration of your studies. If you’re applying for research student status because you’re not confident that you can go straight in as a Master’s student, I would recommend that you focus on preparing yourself and hold off on your application until you’re ready to apply for the degree. The MEXT scholarship is highly competitive and it’s going to be harder to get the scholarship than it is to get in to the degree program. Either go for it all or nothing.
How do I determine a Field of Study or Research Question?
Think about your past research on the same subject and what gaps you found in the field. Then decide how you could help fill those gaps with a specific, detailed project.
If you need help with your specific field or situation, I am available for limited paid consultation. Please contact me if you are interested.
Is it OK if my field of study is different from what I studied in my last degree?
The application guidelines state: “Applicants should apply for the field of study they majored in at university or its related field.” You do not necessarily have to be within the exact same field, but you should be able to explain clearly and concisely how the two are related.
Does my research specifically have to relate to the needs of Japan or my home country?
No, but it would be beneficial to your selection chances, especially for the Embassy-recommended application. You do need to be able to do your fieldwork in Japan for whatever your field is.
Is it possible to study (Insert Field Name Here) in Japan?
If you can find a university that teaches it, yes. (If you would like me to search for universities that teach for you, please contact me to ask about paid consulting services).
Note: If you are applying via the Embassy-recommended scholarship, the fields available to your country may be limited. Please consult with the Japanese embassy in your country for details. Note: If you are applying via the University-recommended scholarship, not all fields may be available under the scholarship. Please refer to the application guidelines for your specific university.
Will (Insert Field Name Here) be received positively by the review committee?
Unfortunately, there is no way to know. Every committee is made up of different individuals with different perspectives and there are too many variables that go into the review to know what becomes the deciding factor.
If you are passionate about a particular field, go for it. Ultimately, all you can control is how well you write and present your Field of Study and Research Program Plan.
Is it OK to choose a Field of Study if I can’t find a university in Japan that teaches it?
No. One of the requirements of the scholarship is that you have to be able to complete your studies in Japan. Also, you would never be able to get a letter of acceptance if no university teaches that field.
I recommend that you consider alternative names for your field of study or a related general field when searching, then try to narrow down to your specific field. (If you would like me to search for universities that teach for you, please contact me to ask about paid consulting services).
Is it advisable to enter a specific university, course, or professor name in the Field of Study and Research Program Plan?
Yes, if you are applying for the University-recommended MEXT scholarship or you are applying for the Embassy-recommended MEXT scholarship and only writing one university in the Placement Preference Form.
Otherwise, no.
Can you send me a sample field of study and research program plan?
No, I don’t have any samples of successful plans at this time. I do have a template available with recommendations on how to write yours, though.
If you want to contribute a successful field of study and research program plan, please let me know!
For the Embassy-recommended MEXT scholarship application, we are supposed to select three universities. Should I write three separate Field of Study forms?
No, you should be targeting three programs/professors that are similar enough that you can write one Field of Study and Research Program Plan that would apply to all three.
Is it possible to submit one Field of Study and Research Program Plan to three professors in different fields?
No, you should be looking for three professors at different universities in the same field who can supervise the same research topic.
For the Embassy-Recommended MEXT application, can I revise my Field of Study and Research Program Plan after the primary screening?
No. You are required to submit the exact same documents to the university. In some cases, the documents will be stamped with the embassy’s seal to verify that they are unaltered.
You can add supporting material, but it may or may not be accepted.
Do you have questions about the Field of Study and Research Program Plan that I haven’t answered above?
Ask them in the comments below and I will update this page as soon as possible. (Please keep in mind that it may take some time for me to catch up).
I’d also recommend signing up for my mailing list, below, to get notified whenever I have updates to any of the FAQs or new articles about the MEXT scholarship!
Related Posts
Hi Travis and thank you for your great efforts, I have a bachelor’s degree and I want to apply for a master’s degree for MEXT. When I write my research timetable, can I include the first year as a research student and 2 years for the master’s degree and 3 years after for the doctoral degree, so that makes them 6 years of researching for the same topic with multiple results OR you would not recommend that? Thank you
Hi Abdulghany,
You should write your research plan for the first degree you intend to apply for and may include one semester as a research student, if you plan to start in that status. The plan should aim for only one research output. If you start as a research student, MEXT expects you to move into the degree program as soon as possible, so at least planning to make the transition after 1 semester would be a good approach.
If you plan to extend to a PhD later, you will have to apply for a scholarship extension at the appropriate time and you will describe your research proposal for the PhD program then. You should not include it at the first application and you don’t have space to do so, anyway. There is a 2-page limit to the Field of Study and Research Program Plan.
Good Luck! – Travis from TranSenz
Hi Travis, In your book How to Write a Scholarship-Winning Field of Study and Research Program Plan you wrote that STEM students should write about what kind of research they want to pursue, instead of a specific plan. If I have a specific idea in STEM can I write about that idea, despite knowing it will change after being assigned an advisor (and I am OK with that), or will that put off potential supervisors, since I will be writing about something that I don’t know if it will be in the interest of the laboratory to do. Thanks and best regards, Marko
Hi Marko Medved,
I’m sorry if I made it sound like STEM students should never write about a specific question in the book. That was not what I meant to imply and I will address the wording in the revised edition that I will be working on soon. It is fine to describe a specific research question, but I recommend that you indicate that you are willing to modify your research to fit into the needs of your advisor’s lab.
You should also research the advisor and their ongoing research in as much detail as possible to be as sure as you can that your proposed research would be of interest to them.
Dear Travis I have a couple of questions, Is it ok if I send my research proposal to the professor i wanted to work with after passing the preliminary screening of the embassy? Do I need to submit the exact same two page research plan to the professor which I submitted to the embassy during the application process? Is it possible to change the research plan if the professor disagrees once i have passed the preliminary screening?
Please help me with this..
Once you submit the FSRPP to the embassy, you must submit the exact same document to the universities when you apply for the Letter of Provisional Acceptance .
That said, the FSRPP is only an application document. Of course you can change your research under your professors’s guidance once you start your degree! So, you could indicate in the FSRPP that you will consult with your professor at the beginning of your studies to finalize your research topic. If the professor asks you to change your research during the Letter of Provisional Acceptance application process, you can discuss it with them and agree to follow the professor’s guidance, even though you can’t change the form.
Thank you so much!!
Dear Travis, I wish to apply for MEXT Scholarship of 2025 session. I’m currently doing my masters degree in marine biology and my dissertation work is on bivalves and their depuration. But I wanted to work 9n microalgae for my PhD and I even talked with a professor from Tokyo University and he advised me to write my proposal based on biofuel production from marine microalgae. But my previous studies and the intended research proposal for not have a connection, but both of them are from the same field marine biology. Moreover I am not able to find any professors actively involved in research regarding bivalves and their depuration. So what should I do regarding my research plan? Please help if you are able to
I saw that you asked the same question on multiple articles, but it seemed most relevant to the article about the Field of Study and Research Program Plan , so I answered it there, first.
Thank you so much Travis for replying to my query!!
Hello, Travis:
First and foremost, I want to express my genuine admiration for your work. The way you help people with their applications is truly commendable, especially considering the limited information available on this subject. Thank you so much!
I can imagine you receive this type of question quite frequently, and I apologize for adding to it. However, I’m seeking some reassurance and guidance. My degree is in Technical-Scientific English-Spanish Translation. However, I currently work as a Japanese translator at a publishing house in my country, and I’m planning to take the JLPT N1 this December.
I have a strong desire to pursue Japanese Linguistics for my Master’s degree through this scholarship, and I intend to leverage my current job to establish a connection between my degree and my desired field of study (besides the fact that translation is inherently linked to linguistics). Could you please let me know if you think this plan is solid? Do you think there is there a possibility of rejection due to my degree’s focus on English?
Thank you very much for your time and attention. Agustín
Hi Augustin,
Thank you for your kind feedback! I am glad to hear that you have found the site useful. Given that you have both a degree and working experience in translation, including Japanese translation, I do not see any problem with applying for a Master’s in linguistics, especially if you can get the N1. You should not face rejection because your previous degree focused on English.
But, of course, just choosing the field of study isn’t going to be enough. You will need a well-developed and impactful research proposal in the Field of Study and Research Program Plan to stand out from other applicants.
Greetings!I have a question. I completed my bachelor’s degree, but I studied in 2 universities. I got equivalence in 4 disciplines from the first school. So, do I have to send the academic transcript (there’s no score on the academic transcript of the last attended school-just a reference to equivalence) of the first school to the MEXT? Thank you for your time.
You will have to submit transcripts for all universities that you attended and earned credits from that counted toward your graduation. If the school that you graduated from only shows that they gave you credit for the previous courses, but does not show the original grades, then you will need the transcript from the first university to show those grades. At least when I was working with the scholarship, pre-transfer grades that were just given as “credit” after transfer weren’t counted for the GPA calculation for eligibility, but MEXT still required that we calculate them for reference and provide the transcripts.
Thank you for the clarification. I’ll do as you advised.
Hi Travis, Thank you for your helpful posts. I have a question about Field of Study and Research Plan. I have done my bachelor degree in Architecture and currently I want to apply for Master’s degree in the same department (Architecture), so I assume it meets the requirements. But, is it okay if I choose different research topic than my previous research? For your information, I did research about architectural acoustic for my undergraduate thesis but now I want to do research about urban design. Do I have to connect the two? I decided to choose different topic since It was really hard to find Japanese universities that have research lab or professors related to architectural acoustic. Sorry if my question is a little bit confusing. Thank you!
As long as your research is in the same field, the research topic does not need to be the same. You don’t need to make a connection between the research topics necessarily, but it would be helpful to mention how your past research studies inspired your interest in the research topic you are proposing in Japan.
Hello, my name is Maja and I’m getting my Master’s in the Japanese Language in April 2023. I’m wondering If I can apply for a Master’s in Japan even though I have a Master’s already? Or must I apply directly for PhD in Japan? Thank you!
Yes, you can apply for a second master’s degree instead of a PhD. But be aware that you will be competing with applicants for both master’s degrees and PhDs, so you’ll need to justify in your application (and particularly in the FSRPP and interview later) why a second master’s is more appropriate for your future goals to serve society.
Hi Travis, I am in my Undergraduate course final year and about to have my exams in around April 2023 and I will receive my degree certificate around July or August but I will lose the 2023-2024 deadline of MEXT. So can I apply without it through University recommendation as a research student.
Hi Sunidhi,
You can apply even if you have not graduated yet, as long as you will have graduated by the time you start your degree in Japan, so you would be eligible to apply for the Embassy-Recommended MEXT Scholarship this year. If you apply before graduation, you will submit your most recent academic transcripts and a Certificate of Expected Graduation.
(Since you are eligible to apply through the Embassy, you would also, of course, be eligible to apply through the University!)
Hello and thank you for the explanation. I would like to know if I can fill in by hand-written the “Field of Study and Research Plan.pdf” document. My adobe does not allow me to edit the document. I am stuck.
If you check out my article on how to fill out the Field of Study and Research Program Plan , I have a link to the word file that MEXT/JASSO provided last year, so you can use that. I do not recommend filling it out by hand if you can avoid it.
Hello Travis. My name is Rodrigo, I am from Mexico. I want to thank you for the blog and especially for your books. They really help me. I have a question, probably not a smart one, but I didn’t see it anywhere in the books or around here (I’m probably wrong). In the field of study and research plan form, below the name and nationality blanks, there is a “box” with the title with 3 points with instructions etc. Should I delete that? “Box”? Make it smaller? Leave like it is. Thanks
Hi Rodrigo,
That’s a good question. I’m not sure if anyone has asked on here before, but many of my coaching/review clients have asked in the past. You should not delete or edit that box. So, when you have to get your Field of Study and Research Program Plan under two pages, it means two sheets of paper including the one with space taken up by the instructions box. That gives you even less space, but I have never seen a FSRPP that couldn’t be condensed to fit in that amount of space while still retaining all of the important parts. It’s just a little more challenging!
Hi Travis, I’m thankful for the work and time you put into this.
I want to ask,if my masters course doesn’t have any correlation with my undergraduate course,will it affect my chances of getting scholarship?, (I studied mass communication as an undergraduate,but now I want to study fashion design or management for masters).
Also,if it turns out that it doesn’t have any effect on me, what category should I choose when applying *MASTERS* or *SPECIAL TRAINING STUDENTS*?
I await your reply 😃, Thank you!!
Hi Emamanuella,
One of the requirements of the MEXT Scholarship for Research Students is that you have to apply in a field of study that you previously majored in at university or its related field. So, if you want to change from Mass Communication to Fashion Design or Management, then first, you need to choose not only your field, but your specific research topic that you want to explore. Then you need to be able to explain how that is related to your undergraduate studies.
The Master’s degree and Special Training Students are two very different scholarship categories. The fields and degrees are different, so you have to choose the one that is most appropriate for your goals. You’d also have to make sure you can find a university or specialized training school that offers your field of study!
I recommend that the first thing you need to do is determine what your goals are after you complete your studies, so that you can decide on what program is best for you. Once you know that, choose your field and, if you want to pursue a Master’s degree, then you also need to choose your specific research topic. From there, you would have to decide what school and program is best for your goals.
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