[2] Early on, Ishida remained in at home in Nayoro, living with his mother and commuting twice monthly to Tokyo by plane to participate in the apprentice school.
[3] At first, Ishida found the apprentice school quite difficult and actually was demoted from 6-kyū to 7-kyū because of poor results; eventually, however, he started to perform better and obtained promotion to 5-kyū.
[3] He passed the entrance exam for the Department of Mathematics for the Faculty of Science and Engineering of Chuo University and began living on his own after his mother moved back to Nayoro.
[3] Being around his fellow fourth-year students who were already going on job interviews and participating in other job-hunting activities made him wonder if he would ever become a professional shogi player.
[3] His mother even said he could come back to Nayoro and look for work if he wanted to after graduation if he still had not obtained professional status, but he decided to continue at the apprentice school,[3] He finally obtained full professional status and the rank of 4-dan in October 2012 after finishing second in the 51st 3-dan League (April 2012 – September 2012) with a record of 13 wins and 5 losses.