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There are some Japanese Terms that I am not sure how to translate in English. Mainly the problem occurs because of these words' perception in Japanese culture.

Like, 学校公開. Japanese call this "Open Campus". It totally makes sense but If I am aware, the correct term is "Open House" in which the school may let you see "the campus".

But if I happen to look a Japanese dictionary for the meaning of "Open House", it says "a (home) party where anyone can join freely" as the first meaning. The meaning related to the school is given as the last meaning in the entries and trust me no Japanese would understand what is an "Open House". Same thing happens with the usage of "cunning" and "envy".

So my first question is how can you translate/explain(with few words) the term;英数コース. Best I can come up with "English and Math Intensive Course" but it is clearly not focused on English and Math. The course students study all subjects. No club, but full study.　

Same as above how can you say 特進コース. Special Advanced? Does it makes sense?

Another question is, imagine a brochure that a student stating his feelings in a speech bubble. In Japanese, they call it "生徒の声". However, instead of writing that in Japanese, they just typed it as "Voice". Should not it be "Student Voice"? Or what else it can be? Commentary is the matching description. But again, no Japanese would understand that.

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    1) What do you mean by look a Japanese dictionary for the meaning of "Open House"? What did you do, exactly? 2) Please do not ask more than one thing at a time.
    – naruto
    Commented Jun 6, 2019 at 5:38
  • 1) It means; I searched for the meaning of "Open House" in a dictionary. And it gave me the meaning of 学校公開 as the last meaning, which means it is not used in this way normally, in fact yes, Japanese just call this "Open Campus". 2) I see no problem with asking more than 1 question as the root of these problems is same; perception of certain words by Japanese people.
    – Grizzly
    Commented Jun 6, 2019 at 5:43
  • I mean, which did you use, an English-Japanese dictionary, a monolingual English dictionary or a monolingual Japanese dictionary? Why did you look at a "Japanese dictionary" and get "a (home) party where anyone ..."? And what do you mean by "Japanese call this open campus"? Do you mean exchange Japanese students are saying open campus in English, or do you mean オープンキャンパス in Japanese is a misnomer?
    – naruto
    Commented Jun 6, 2019 at 5:51
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    Your way of googling is wrong. As I said, if you google "Open House 意味", that will only give you the definition of the English phrase open house, not how Japanese people use it in their daily life. FYI, オープンハウス means nothing in Japanese at least in the context of school. In Japanese, 学校公開 and オープンキャンパス have similar but different meanings, and I can explain the difference using simple English, but I'm not the right person to give your the best English phrase.
    – naruto
    Commented Jun 6, 2019 at 6:30
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    I would note that for the different course wordings, there may not be an accurate widespread English "translation." This is because 1. The type of study may not exist in America/England/Australia etc. so a short phrase wouldn't convey the right meaning and 2. Different schools have different names for the same types of courses. Where I am from my school had "Honors", "Advanced", "Accelerated" and "AP" math classes. Those adjectives don't distinguish much about the type of course, and the terms aren't always consistent between schools. and AP is a brand name that mostly known in the US.
    – katatahito
    Commented Jun 6, 2019 at 8:19

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Looking at this website and judging based on the descriptions and pictures, it seems as though 英数コース is aimed for students who want to go to the best universities, and so want to take difficult courses in preparation for that.

A similar phrase in American Engish (likely not encompassing all the connotation) would be a College Preparatory or College-Prep Course, or a Prep School. Prep School refers to a whole school, as opposed to a specific track of courses.

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  • Unfortunately your answer would not help me but, your comment above actually gave me an option to offer. The word "accelerated" might actually help.
    – Grizzly
    Commented Jun 6, 2019 at 23:15

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