An elementary school in Nagoya has abruptly dropped its class photos, and some parents are angry — not only at the loss of a yearly ritual but at how the decision was made. About 220 households signed a petition asking the city's board of education to bring the photos back, and parents held a press conference to press their case.
The school had taken a class photo in every class at the start of each school year. Parents learned the practice was ending from a school newsletter handed out in April 2026, which said the photos that month would not be taken or sold, under the heading "not carried out from this school year."
The cancellation follows a voyeurism case involving a teacher, which the source identifies as the backdrop to the decision but does not describe in detail.
Parents say they were told too little
One parent said the change had not been properly explained before it took effect. "It is hard to say that this important change was sufficiently communicated to parents," the parent said.
Another said the decision belonged with families, not the school alone. "Children have been asking, 'Why isn't there one?' The thing we find most questionable is that the school decided on its own, just like that, to do away with class photos," the parent said.
A third parent described the photo as something the children took for granted. "When I found out it was going away, I felt one of their memories was being taken. The children wanted it so much that they went to ask their homeroom teacher, 'When are we taking it this year?'"
That parent also said the photo carried information beyond the image itself. "It's something you can only take at that time, so for both parents and children it was just, 'Why?' When I go to the school for an open day, I can say to my child's friends, 'Thanks for the other day.' Having a photo and being able to talk with friends about it is a really big piece of information."
A petition to the board of education
The parents who spoke at the press conference said they had asked Nagoya to instruct the school on the matter.
“It is hard to say that this important change was sufficiently communicated to parents.”a parent of a pupil at the school
The source is the first part of a report by Yomiuri TV.