These came from families with children here now, families who have graduated, and our own staff. Nothing has been edited or shortened.
These were written in Japanese. What follows is our translation of them — as faithful as we can make it, but not the words the families typed.
Current families在園児さんご家族
Age 3
She came up to the Academy from RaJA International Preschool, and English that used to be single words has turned into sentences. Lately she has settled in and says so herself — “It was fun! I want to go again tomorrow!” She is full of feeling, taking in all sorts of things every day, and it is a joy to watch her grow. She tells us all about what happened at the Academy, too. I hope she goes on meeting people and languages and cultures from all over, so that she has plenty of choices and a rich life ahead of her.
A family in their first year
They treasure each child’s individuality, and it is a place you can leave your child with an easy mind. Normally there would be one or two things you wish were a little different; with RaJA there is nothing at all. We are simply grateful, all the time.
Age 3
Our son was at another nursery until partway through his second year, but things happened there — for him and for us both — and we began to think about moving him. What we were looking for was a nursery where our son could be himself: unhurried, and full of smiles. We visited more of the enormous number of nurseries in Kagoshima City than we can count, and the one we finally found was RaJA Global Academy.
From the very first week after he joined, we saw a great many changes. They were visible enough that both of us — and the family who support us — were startled. He smiled more, and we heard something we had never heard before: “I want to go to RaJA, quickly.” That was such a relief, and such a joy. Being able to talk closely with the teachers, seeing teachers and children spend their days smiling and enjoying themselves, the warmth of every word the teachers said — all of it saved us. And it brought home to us again how much a child’s environment matters. While we were choosing a nursery we had the chance to talk to a great many mothers.
It troubled me that although a nursery is such an important thing, most people were settling for one. Now, looking at our son, I want to tell as many parents as I can, with my head up: a nursery is not somewhere you settle. There is a wonderful one — RaJA! It is a place where the children, the teachers and the parents all get to smile. If you want somewhere your child can be a child, unhurried and full of smiles, and if you carry even a small worry about your nursery, please come and do a trial at RaJA. The difference from other schools is plain to see. It is a truly, truly lovely place.
The teachers hold deep reserves of knowledge about education, and they read the children without cutting a single corner. Our family found a wonderful place to belong, and now we get to spend every day smiling. A child is a person too. For your child’s sake — will you spend these precious early years with us, in a good environment, without the stress?
Age 4
I wanted my child to grow up with English close at hand from an early age, so I was looking at international schools — but the opening hours, the location and the distance to drop off never quite worked, and I had nearly given up when I heard that RGA was opening. I asked about their philosophy of care and thought: this is everything I have been looking for, all in one place. I absolutely want my child to spend her days here. I was so drawn in that we transferred her for the nenshō year. She loves her friends and her teachers, and every day looks like fun. In the mornings it is “Is RaJA open yet?”, “Let’s go to RaJA” — she looks forward to it. Her English pronunciation is beautiful, and I get lost listening to it; I keep asking her to say it again. And not only English — Japanese, too. She had learnt hiragana somewhere along the way, and one day she brought over the children’s map of Japan we had at home and started reading out prefecture names. She is picking up so much through her days there that we are constantly caught out — when did that happen? The teachers watch the children closely and take each child’s individuality seriously; you can feel how high their standards are, as educators and as carers. I am simply grateful that they built such a wonderful environment for our child, and that we found it. The time she has left at RGA has become very precious to us. I hope she grows a rich sensibility, learns to think for herself from several angles, and goes out into the world.
The H family
When we were wondering what to do about our eldest daughter’s kindergarten, she kept saying how much fun English Time at her nursery was, and while we were looking for somewhere she could enjoy the English she was interested in, we found RaJA. Before she started she was shy with strangers, so we worried about whether she would enjoy going and whether she could keep up in an English lesson she had never studied for. But at drop-off and pick-up the teachers and staff would tell us what had happened that day and what she had managed, so we knew they were really watching the children. We would look through the photographs they post every day as a family, and she would happily tell us “Today at RaJA I did this”, “I played this with my friend” — and we could relax, knowing she was having a good time. The other day she was reading a wordless picture book we had borrowed from the library, and when I asked, she was making up the story and telling it in English. She points at things she notices and names them in English, and when a word she has learned comes up in a Japanese conversation she tells me, delighted, “That’s ⋯ in English.” Sometimes her pronunciation is so good that we cannot follow it. Compared with before she started, her English and her ability to communicate have grown enormously. She has several allergies, which restricts a lot of things. But her meals are adapted for them, and day-to-day matters are handled as they come up, so she can attend just like everyone else. There are so many curricula suited to each individual child, parent-and-child events, events from around the world — the teachers must be worn out preparing them, and yet at drop-off, or when we join an event, none of that shows: they are enjoying it alongside the children. That a place of this standard exists, where children learn while genuinely enjoying themselves, is down to the ability of those teachers and everyone involved, and we are grateful for it. She really does look forward to RaJA — even at the weekend she often says she wants to go tomorrow, that she wants to play with her friends. We are grateful from the heart to the teachers and everyone who keeps building the place she loves so much, and we intend to enjoy what is left of her kindergarten years alongside her.
A family with us 2 years and 1 month
We transferred in in the March of the nenshō year. At first our aim was purely the language side of an English environment, but the way they build a global outlook, and the way the care is directed at each child’s particular character, felt like something we could not find elsewhere. Being able to do all the extra lessons in one go is wonderful for working parents, too.
A family with us since their child was a baby
Our daughter, now in her final year at the Academy, was still unborn when we came across the nursery in Shimoarata. We were drawn to how the school was run, to the atmosphere, and to the founder’s thinking, and asked to enrol her straight away. She was born safely, and joined at a few months old. Leaving such a small child and going back to work was a fight with my own anxiety; balancing childcare and work took time to get used to, and there was no slack in our lives. But the affectionate staff and teachers at the nursery rescued me, and our daughter looked happy every day.
All through that, I kept wishing — if only RaJA had a kindergarten too. That wish came true, and the Academy opened with everything we could have hoped for in it. She has been going happily since the day it opened, and she loves it.
When I go to collect her, it is often “I don’t want to go home yet!” — and even when she is unwell, “I want to go!” As a parent, there is nothing better. Her English, obviously, but also a way of thinking that is international without anyone making a point of it; the RaJA right-brain work, the music, all the different programmes she gets to enjoy while she learns. Watching her smile every day and seeing how full her days are, I feel that it is not only the education — her emotional life is growing properly too. I am genuinely glad she is there.
Our two younger children are at the RaJA nursery as well, and I honestly feel our children are being raised by RaJA. Meeting RaJA, and having our family supported by it, has left us full of gratitude. One of the lovely things is how many teachers and friends have known her since she was a baby. Leaving those friends and this environment when she graduates will be sad, but as a RaJA parent I am looking forward to the future of our daughter and of all the children we have known since they were small. And I will be cheering RaJA on, curious to see how it grows from here.
Graduated families卒園児さんご家族
A friend who joined us for the final year
A year has gone by since he started, and graduation day arrived in no time at all. We had spent two years at an ordinary kindergarten, troubled by how little English there was, and I remember clearly how moved I was the first time we met RaJA — it was so close to the environment I had been looking for. From the day he joined he came home happy and told us about his day, and his English took hold visibly, week by week. In a hospital waiting room he picked up an English picture book and read it aloud, fluently and beautifully, and everyone around us looked equally astonished; I was moved myself. That he could grow this much in a single year is partly how much children absorb, of course, but it is also down to excellent staff. Plenty of kindergartens say they treasure each child’s individuality; very few actually follow it through and care for the details. At RaJA we saw staff respect the children’s opinions and treat them the way they would treat an adult. There were also plenty of moments of free discussion in a global setting. The year he spent at RaJA has become part of how he lives, and one day those wings will carry him out into the world. Thank you for a genuinely meaningful year.
Our staffスタッフ
Age 5
I am the mother of twin sisters, and an employee of RaJA Co., Ltd. I joined in April 2022, and was told then that RGA would open that August. At the time the twins were at a kindergarten in the city, but my husband and I talked it over and decided immediately to move them. The reason was that, working at RaJA, I had seen the founder’s philosophy of care and the depth of the teachers’ affection for the children at close range, and I wanted to entrust my own children to the RGA that this remarkable place was building. They joined in the nenshō year and are now in their final year, touching English every day, having all sorts of experiences, blessed with lovely teachers and friends, and enjoying themselves. Watching them, I feel from the heart that moving them to RGA was right. Being an employee, I also see the inside — for better and for worse. RGA has only been open about two years, so there are challenges that come with growing, but I watch the whole staff face them rather than look away: training, meetings, everyone pushing each other to make RGA better. If I were unhappy with it my children would not be here, and I do not think I would be working at RaJA either. I want them to enjoy the six months or so they have left as RGA children to the full.
Age 5 and Preschool
I enrolled my eldest at RaJA International Preschool when he was eight months old. It was my first child and my first nursery, and I was lost; the teachers gave me careful advice on each thing in turn, not only about the nursery but about parenting at home. Seeing him go in happily, I was certain this was somewhere I could leave him with an easy mind. On the language side, too, just watching him sing songs in Chinese at home as well as in English, or answer in Spanish, made it clear how much he was picking up of different languages and cultures through playing with teachers from all over.
When he graduated from the preschool the Academy did not exist yet, and we moved him, tearfully, to another certified school with a strong international programme — but we missed the RaJA memories and the RaJA way of caring almost every day. So when the founder told me an Academy taking children from the nenshō year would open that summer, I was overjoyed, and decided without hesitation to move him back.
Once he started, his English shot up: ask him a question in English and the answer comes back in a full sentence, and his pronunciation has gone so native that the adults cannot always catch it. These days I am the one asking my child what a word means. Ha!
Our younger child is now at RaJA International Preschool as well, and I so admired the environment and the character of the teachers that I became a member of staff myself. RaJA, which I already thought was wonderful, became more wonderful the moment I was working here. What struck me most is that the founder and every member of staff think not only about the children but about caring for the children’s families. The contact books and the words from the teachers, which I used to read without thinking much about them, I now feel keenly — the teachers write and speak while holding the children and their families in mind. Both my children and I are truly, truly glad we found RaJA.
Age 3
My daughter went to the Preschool from age one, and came up to the Academy in the nenshō year. When she first started, she would cry if she saw Mummy in the same room, so I worked in disguise. Ha!
The teachers face even a one-year-old as a person in their own right. They do not talk down to children or fob them off; they take the time to listen properly, and they said a great deal to my daughter. Even a small child has a will of her own, and there are adults who acknowledge it — that is what she felt, day after day, in a school life full of love.
RaJA’s care broke the idea I had of what a nursery is, in the best sense. Standing under a shower of English from native teachers, and coming to say the names of things beautifully in English at the same time as in Japanese, happened because she was at RaJA.
Since she came up to the Academy in the nenshō year, I feel her English has taken another jump.
The other night she half woke and mumbled “Mum, drink please.” English, with her brain not even switched on?! It astonished me. Ha! At the Academy she is surrounded by friends and bright teachers, and she is thriving. When she gets in the car after pick-up, she says, without fail, “The Academy was fun!” Because it is an international school, before she started I did worry — will she stop being able to speak Japanese when she goes up to primary school? Will she be unable to write hiragana? But there is proper support for the move to primary school, RIT and the Enpitsu Club and so on, so we moved her up with confidence.
Standing in a shower of English from the age of one, gathering all these experiences at RaJA — I am very much looking forward to seeing what kind of adult this expressive child becomes.
Age 4
My daughter, nearly five, has been here four and a half years. My husband has Filipino roots and I am Japanese; we both have complicated backgrounds, and I was full of anxiety about giving birth and raising a child.
I still remember April 2019, going to see the cherry blossom along the Kōtsuki river. I was four months pregnant, and we happened to walk past RaJA International Preschool. “There is an international nursery in Kagoshima?” — I looked it up when I got home, and that is how I came to know RaJA. The founder’s philosophy, the shower of language, being able to arrive empty-handed, not using anime-character things: the more I read, the stronger the feeling got — I want to leave my child here.
After she was born, my daughter joined RaJA at four months, and I took a job at another nursery. There I wore a character-print apron, and care was delivered against age brackets and tendencies — nought-year-olds are nought-year-olds, one-year-olds are one-year-olds — rather than to the individual. It left me uneasy, and glad all over again that my own child was at RaJA.
It is precisely because I knew both — the nursery you find anywhere, and the care that only exists at RaJA — that the reassurance mattered so much: teachers who do not treat a child as a child but respect her as a person, and an environment that takes even a family’s background into account. For a mother raising a child while working, that was an enormous support.
When my daughter moved into the two-year-old class I was given the chance to work at RaJA, and I have been here ever since, feeling at last that I could give something back.
She is at the Academy now — open-hearted, and able to say thank you and sorry in her own words. I feel her growing every day. She is choosing her own path and being herself so completely that I can see there is no need for us as parents to load expectations on her, and that is thanks to RaJA.
RaJA, where a child’s own agency is there from the age of nought, where the adults enjoy it alongside them, and where you want to stay — it has become a warm HOME for our family.
I picture a future where the children who graduate come back and say “I’m home!” as primary pupils, as secondary pupils, as adults. “Because we have a home we can love, we can love the world too” is our family motto, and as both a parent and an employee I am very much looking forward to watching RaJA, and the children growing up in it, go on growing.
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RaJA GLOBAL ACADEMY & C-Lab + Education
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