Two Penn students receive scholarships to study in Japan

Nearly 15 years ago Web Coates, then a first-grader, learned to write his name in Japanese. So began a passion that first led the College and Wharton junior to study Japanese in high school and college and, more recently, has inspired him to spend the upcoming school year studying at Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo, Japan. Coates, a 20 year-old student in the Huntsman Program in International Studies and Business, was recently named as one of two Penn students -- and one of 30 college students nationwide -- to receive a Bridging Project scholarship to travel to Japan and study for the year. Wharton junior Ji Sun Park will also receive a scholarship. The scholarships are administered collaboratively by the Association of Teachers of Japanese -- a Boulder, Colo.-based organization of Japanese teachers in America -- and the Japan-United States Friendship Commission, an independent federal agency that tries to increase study abroad opportunities in Japan for American students. The program is designed for college students with particular interests in Japanese culture. Coates will receive a $3,000 stipend and round trip airfare, though he is required to find housing in Tokyo on his own. Coates was born in Washington, D.C., but he graduated from Phillips Academy in Andover, Mass. He was tutored in Japanese -- which he now speaks fluently -- throughout high school. Travelling halfway across the world is nothing new to Coates. He spent a year studying in a Japanese high school in Kobe, where he adopted numerous cultural practices -- so much that several of his friends joke with him that he is more Japanese than American. The Japanese, for example, place a greater emphasis on developing close interpersonal relationships and mutual respect, according to Coates. "It's hard for me at age 20 to say, 'Did I learn respect from studying in Japan, or did I learn it on my own?'" Coates said. While in Tokyo, Coates will study International Business, Area Studies and Japanese History in classes of around 40 to 50 Japanese students. Studying in Japan, says Coates, will enable him to combine his two academic interests -- business and Japanese. "I'm being converted into a little Whartonite," Coates joked. The application for the scholarship, which Coates submitted in March, consisted of an essay, a transcript, a letter of recommendation and a letter of acceptance from a Japanese university. According to the Commission's Executive Director Eric Gangloff, the 300 students who submitted applications for the scholarships represented a "broad diversity" of interests and were not, by any means, all Japanese majors. "We're looking for students of extraordinary ability who cross the range of disciplines," Gangloff said.