A Japanese native I have come to know on Facebook for about a month now has kindly pointed out to me the missing details concerning Japanese school toilet cleaning practices. Apparently there are no custodians; teachers do the serious cleaning work, while students do what is within their capabilities and without using chemicals, precisely because everyone’s expected to do it, yet allergies could interfere with that. But it is not, as I saw one blogger claim, that their toilets go without being sanitized for 6 months at a time. (I was like, get real! Disease would have every single school shut down if it was like that.) Parents are invited to help clean the toilets and so on during semester breaks, along with students and teachers. Many do.

I’m trying to decide who would complain the most bitterly if this was tried in Canada or the US: students, teachers, or parents? I’m thinking parents, closely followed by teachers.

Is requiring a student with asthma to attend PE worse than not giving students a chance to exercise their bodies? Students can be excused from PE with a letter from a parent and physician.