Approximately 20,000 participants and about 2,000 schools take part every year.
Organized by the public broadcaster NHK: the NHK Cup.
The final round is judged by leading figures such as renowned writers and film directors.
In the reading‑aloud* category:
3 students; 1 student won the prefectural competition for two consecutive years.
The second largest national competition
Organized by the All Japan Senior High School Cultural Federation (“Soubun”).
In the reading‑aloud category:
2 students; 1 student won the prefectural competition.
Total*: 4 students advanced to national competitions over 4 years
(7 years in total across terms).
Thanks to the achievements mentioned above, the students were selected to serve as hosts for the opening ceremony of Japan’s most widely watched high‑school sports festival
—an event that attracts attention across all generations, even more than the FIFA World Cup—
and to perform on stage alongside leading Japanese multidisciplinary artists.
I accompanied and supported them during rehearsals and performances, learning together with them.
・Summer prefectural baseball tournament (an event that, even at the prefectural level, draws nationwide, multigenerational attention comparable to the FIFA World Cup).
Participation for two consecutive years.
・National tournament for all athletic clubs.* In addition to hosting, students produced a motivational opening‑ceremony video by interviewing the player who had been the national high‑school soccer champion the previous year.
They received instruction from a specialist who trains professional announcers at the public broadcaster.
・Joint performances in ensemble pieces and staged reading productions with Sakumi Hagiwara*, one of Japan’s leading visual artists and filmmakers, as well as with professional actors*.
・In the NHK Cup *Television Documentary Division, I served as the chief judge for Group A in the quarterfinals.
I received training as a judge and as an instructor from directors and professional announcer‑trainers at the public broadcaster, through which I learned planning, research, scriptwriting, editing, and related skills.
Explanatory notes
＊In practical terms, five students participated in national competitions over five years.
In the 2020 autumn prefectural tournament, one student received the Award of Excellence in the reading‑aloud category and another received the Award of Merit in the announcement category.
In non‑pandemic years, the Award of Excellence leads to national‑level participation, and the Award of Merit leads to participation in the Kanto regional competition.
＊The national tournament that all athletic clubs had been preparing for was not held due to the COVID‑19 pandemic.
＊Sakumi Hagiwara: His pioneering work, which integrates visual arts such as painting and photography with theatre, music, and language, is distinguished by both its originality and its strong public dimension.
He is the grandson of Hagiwara Sakutarō, known as “the father of modern Japanese poetry.”
As the Special Director of the Maebashi Literature Museum, located in his grandfather’s hometown, he organized in 2022—marking the 80th anniversary of Sakutarō’s death—a large-scale simultaneous exhibition held across 52 institutions nationwide, including literary museums, art museums, and universities, making active use of online networks.
He undertakes numerous projects that reconsider the contemporary nature of language, transcending conventional frameworks.
＊I myself participated in the NHK Cup national competition in the announcement category as a high‑school student, conducting my own interviews and writing my own script.
＊In the reading‑aloud category, participants also select the work and the specific passages themselves.
＊The collaboration with actors was made possible through the achievements of the previous year’s faculty advisor.
＊Approximately 500 schools nationwide participate in the NHK Cup Television Documentary Division.
＊The initiative titled “Centered on DX and Community Resources,
Industry-School Collaboration”* was driven by my intention to give back more fully to the school and the local community what I had learned as an instructor
while supporting these students in their various performance opportunities.
*Details: “Articles Instagram & Website – Teaching Portfolio”
Modern
Dissertation: “‘To Be’ and ‘To Do’” by Masao Maruyama, one of the leading legal and political theorists of postwar Japan.
Novel:“The Dancing Girl (舞姫,Maihime)” by Mori Ōgai —“Life or career advancement:
the anguish of a young bureaucrat who lived through the transition from pre-modern Japan to modern Japan”.
Free verse:“I was born” by Hiroshi Yoshino.“Encountering a mode of linguistic expression that grasps the world and opens the future — a poignant and bittersweet memory.”
Interdisciplinary learning: “Centered on DX and Community Resources,Industry-School Collaboration”*
*Details: “Articles Instagram & Website – Teaching Portfolio”
Classics
Chinese:“史記(Shiji)” — a historical work that conveys truth through biographies.
“The Ferry Port of Wujiang — The hero who fights his final battle without crossing the river back to his homeland”.
Japanese:“The Tale of Genji”
“The Carriage Conflict — Lady Rokujō, her feeling of love that transforms into the evil spirit of a living person.
During my university years
In a collaborative course involving approximately 150 students from multiple faculties, we explored the contemporary significance of Crime and Punishment.
The class, “Russian Literature and the Contemporary World I,” taught by Professor Atsushi Sakaniwa at Waseda University, examined universal themes such as “the extraordinary individual and the law” and “salvation and faith.”
Through a comparative cultural perspective and attention to expressive techniques, we deepened our analysis while engaging with a wide range of materials, including film adaptations.
During my high school years
I attended a lecture by Dr. Masatoshi Koshiba, the 2002 Nobel Prize laureate in Physics, titled “Dialogue Between Neutrino Research and Shuntarō Tanikawa’s Cosmic Poetry.”
At the time, my school was designated as a Super Science High School (SSH) by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, offering classes taught by various leading scientists.
Graduated from TAKASAKI GIRLS’ HIGH SCHOOL.
*Shuntarō Tanikawa stood at the forefront of postwar contemporary poetry. His representative works capture the cosmos through sensory expression and celebrate the vitality of life.
Undergraduate Degree
Research Area: Modern Japanese free verse and the public education system that supported its development
Title: “Reevaluating the Overlooked Literary Figure: Banson Hirai”
Abstract:
This study investigates the contemporary significance of public education and the literary activities of writers from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century,
in order to understand how education can cultivate “captivating language”—language that integrates culture, morality, sensibility, and humor, going beyond the grammatically refined beauty valued in business and cultural promotion.
Although Banson Hirai died of tuberculosis at the age of thirty‑five and thus did not fully develop the literary achievements that would later characterize figures such as the novelist Ryōtarō Shiba—who fused artistic quality with popular appeal—
or the lyric poet Yaso Saijō, he was continuously commissioned to write in a wide range of genres, including journalism, fiction, poetry, and folk songs.
His legacy includes school songs—still sung without alteration at high schools whose origins lie in the early prefectural middle schools—as well as thirty‑one published books and more than 556 works printed in magazines.
He is one of the writers distinguished by a linguistic power capable of vividly conveying both reality and imagination in an era before visual media became widespread.
Because previous research was largely conducted by his relatives, I took advantage of the geographical and academic proximity—sharing the same university department and hometown as the author—to collect primary materials.
Drawing on avant‑garde and traditional poetry and song from the same period, as well as literature from across cultures and eras, I conducted an objective reevaluation of his work.
© 2026 Rika Ogasawara