Anime high school are some of the most stellar slice-of-life avenues available to the medium. It opens up nostalgic memories of a transitional yet ever transformative period in anyone's life, full of romance, body changes, and just generally being awkward walking down a hallway. These anime also act as many people's introduction to the vastly different cultural upbringing and education systems available in Japan.
Being an anime fan long enough, anyone could have their own yearbook comprised of fond, developing memories of these fictional students. So, finish up that homework assignment and get ready to check out the best anime based on student life.
10 Great Teacher Onizuka
An oddly inspirational series given its perverted, uninhibited titular character, Great Teacher Onizuka takes a close look at what student life has become, examining its point in the family matters of a country that values work over people, as well as a system that admonishes the below average with poorer resources.
The series brings in a main character who has seen and done it all and wants to move past a criminal past to better himself and the lives of these struggling students. While his methods have certainly become outdated, Onizuka's stab at student life is in just having a life outside of being a student.
9 My Hero Academia
There are few battle shonen set within schools that actually keep up with its academic element. The kids of Naruto essentially become soldiers as soon as they exit the classroom, and everyone in Soul Eater is already a functioning, superpowered agent destined to protect the world. It's refreshing for the genre to have a series actually scale its young characters back a bit and remind everyone that they're still developing young minds.
That doesn't mean just boring schoolwork, mind you. My Hero Academia blends its fantasy/action elements near seamlessly with the schoolwork to give its characters a tangible sense of growth and competition. It's almost so believable that one could even imagine attending U.A. themselves. If only...
8 Daily Lives of High School Boys
Not everything has to be all schoolwork and self-improvement or whatever. Sometimes, accurately capturing student life just means capturing the mundane yet ever silly scenes held between classes and after school. Such is the dynamic of Daily Lives of High School Boys.
This comedy series is well-grounded in its actual world yet still incredibly ridiculous with the actions and wild imaginations of its titular high school boys (and, every now and then, funky high school girls). A youthful and even oddly nostalgic ride, this series will remind everyone that being a student sometimes meant just being a kid.
7 Baka and Test: Summon the Beasts
Japanese school life can be a competitive terrain. Embedded in the politics and culture is a strive to work hard and be the best, a fundamental principle shared with its youth within the education system. Such is the life that Baka and Test likes to exaggerate, parody, and even sympathize with.
In a school that not only bases the standard of classroom arrangements for its students based on test scores but also hologram avatars that they can use to fight each other, this series likes to emphasize that Japanese school life really is relentless and an continuous battle to the top.
6 Kaguya-sama: Love is War
How could one talk about student life without at least mentioning the student councils that go into defending and facilitating it? Kaguya-sama: Love is War is perhaps the best, most recent example of this. Beyond capturing the tsundere-esque battles of love between its main characters, this series does portray a faithful group of active students who want to lead student life in as efficient and pleasant of a manner as possible.
This means constantly thinking about their well-being, constantly planning and budgeting activities, and, every now and then, giving relationship advice. This series is adorable in more ways than one.
5 Assassination Classroom
Beyond just resources and leadership, a major factor within student life is, of course, the teacher. A good teacher plays a major role in inspiring students to become better versions of themselves, whereas an overly critical one could break and discourage them. Such is the balance and the war of education principles that is Assassination Classroom, a series that takes the premise of Baka and Test to a near-totalitarian extreme.
However, not all is gloom and doom, as Assassination Classroom features an ambitious teacher who shows the students just what personal attention and passion could do to help them. Assassinating one's teacher also makes for a pretty active extracurricular.
4 The Tatami Galaxy
The Tatami Galaxy is a wonderful example that one's student life is totally dependent on what one makes of it. Showcasing the trials and tribulations of Watashi as he tries to guarantee for himself a "rose-colored campus life," this series examines alternate timelines discerning between different possible choices he could have made.
What would happen if Watashi joined the film club? What if he joined the tennis club? What happens if he goes after this girl? It's an interesting examination on the little what-ifs of a major, transitional period and a loud cry to the viewer to take and appreciate the opportunities displayed before them.
3 SKET Dance
Adding on to the notion that student life is what one makes of it, if all one needs to better their school days is a little push, then what's stopping someone from being that push? Such is the life of the student service club that is the SKET-dan, a group of positive, active students looking to help out anyone and everyone in their school with whatever problem comes their way.
Handling all tasks with the same fervor of a battle shonen team, this eccentric group works hard to investigate, talk, and even fight with the problems facing their fellow peers.
2 The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
As much as wanting to improve student life is a noble gesture, there's nothing wrong with helping other students find more. Where the SKET-dan ventures into the trials of the everyday, the SOS Brigade looks for trouble in the strange and paranormal.
It inspired and encourages the viewer to want something a little more than the mundane tones of the everyday while still addressing how okay it is to love the world the way it is. It is a balancing act between passion and acceptance that many youths can relate to, and it is certainly taken to its wild extremes in a series full of aliens, time travelers, and psychics.
1 Ouran High School Host Club
Perhaps no other anime has portrayed student life with the same panache and rose-colored glasses the same way Ouran High School Host Club has (sorry Tatami Galaxy). This is the series that got many people into the shoujo, high school genre of anime, and it sets a great example with its slapstick comedy, strong sense of community, and, as if any high school anime could go five minutes without it, romance and a variety of love triangles.
This series draws all of that in with its own unique cast of lovable characters who not only seek to create leisure and service within student life but also seek to protect their own. It's an outrageous yet ever intimately funny group that anime fans every where still want join.