MEXT Undergraduate Scholarship?

Hi guys, I'm facing a dilemma.

I've been accepted into Waseda SILS' 2017 September intake, but I'm not sure whether I want to accept it as I'm eyeing the MEXT scholarship. If I were to apply for the scholarship, I would try for a spot in Kyoto University.

Now the main reason why I have qualms about accepting Waseda's offer is because of the general consensus that their education at SILS is lacking in terms of academic vigour, so I'm not very sure that I can justify the money that goes into it.

However, I am aware of the competitiveness of the MEXT scholarship selection process, so the question now is whether I should take the risk and apply for MEXT or just go ahead and accept Waseda's offer.

If anyone here has ever applied for the MEXT undergrad scholarship, could you share more about the entrance examination process? I've been rather confused about that bit. Do we have to sit for the actual entrance examination or is it just an application online like how one usually applies for Waseda, for example.

Note: I have a GPA of 3.5, and a SAT score of 1370 (new SAT out of 1600). Do you guys think I could stand a good chance?

I'll try to give some info.

I think MEXT depends on your country and the subject you choose. Someone I know in a South East Asian country applied and passed the final interview but there was no spot open.

Not sure about the selection in every country, but for him it was something like Document Screening, Test, Interview, Information gets sent to Monbusho, Information gets sent to each university, University checks slot availability, Notification of acception or rejection. (Imagine all those commas as right arrows). He was applying for Medicine only, I think that's more difficult.

His results are pretty good, he didn't take the SAT but he got 8.5 for IELTS and above 110 for TOEFL. I believe he could get around 1500 for SAT if he took it.

Waseda is a reputable university in Japan, even if it's getting worse, there's still something. SILS is a huge department with a lot of party-type students, so it should be fun if you really want to have fun. But academic wise, there should be better choices.

Something to add, you could try applying for scholarships. I got a 50% scholarship offer when I applied for SILS last year. Didn't take it though.

Thanks for the input! I'm currently leaning to just accepting Waseda's offer as I highly doubt I'll be able to pass the entrance exam for Kyoto Uni even if I were to attain the scholarship. I read that I will need to take the same exam as the students in Japan and I highly doubt that I will be able to beat out all the competitors for Kyoto Uni.

Does anyone have any idea what the entrance exam is like? Is it like math and science for say, a humanities course?