With its 150th anniversary on the horizon, the Waseda University mission statement issued on its 30th anniversary by founder Okuma Shigenobu looms over everything the university does as the institution looks toward the future, said President Aiji Tanaka.
“In his 1913 statement, Okuma urged that independence of scholarship be preserved, and that the research undertaken will make some social contribution. He also urged (students and scholars) not to stop at being satisfied with the results of their research, but to also find practical uses for it,” Tanaka said. Okuma’s ultimate goal, he explained, was to encourage Waseda to produce “model citizens” who can make contributions to better conditions around the world.
This thinking has provided a framework for the efforts Waseda is pursuing guided by the basic question of, “What kind of university should Waseda be after 2032?” Hence, Tanaka said, the emphasis is not just on education and research, but also on thinking carefully about how Waseda can contribute to society.
Centers to coordinate global impact
Founded in 1882, Waseda — then known as Tokyo Senmon Gakko (Tokyo Vocational School) — has grown from an institution with 80 students and three departments to one with more than 47,000 students studying in 13 undergraduate and 20 graduate schools.
Waseda is also Japan’s top university for sending students abroad, and similarly has long welcomed large numbers of foreign students and scholars to its campuses around Tokyo and elsewhere. Accordingly, with becoming a “Waseda that shines on the global stage” by 2050 presenting an underlying theme for the university’s 150th anniversary projects, internationalization has been a particular emphasis.
Toward that end, Tanaka said, rather than creating new departments or programs, Waseda has for some time now been reassessing its existing offerings and reorganizing them into three new centers to reflect these long-term goals. The university opened its Global Education Center in 2013, and followed it this past April with its Global Research Center.
The buildings were completed with the opening in April of the Global Citizenship Center. The GCC’s purpose, said Tanaka, is to provide coordinated systemic support to, for example, student volunteer activities, such as by offering courses on leadership. The goal here, he said, is for Waseda to provide an “international interface” for facilitating students’ and scholars’ activities overseas and bringing their foreign counterparts to Waseda. Moreover, in the future, he said, Waseda hopes to provide the opportunity for all its undergraduates to spend at least part — if not all — of one year studying abroad.
Additionally, Tanaka added, Waseda already provides extensive educational opportunities in English, with a significant percentage of faculty able to provide instruction and conduct their own research in both Japanese and English. By way of example, nearly half of the teaching staff in Tanaka’s own Faculty of Political Science and Economics obtained their doctorates at universities overseas and roughly 80% can teach in either language.
Crossing disciplinary boundaries
Waseda also continues to encourage interdisciplinary research, Tanaka said, especially work that combines studies in engineering or natural sciences with studies in the humanities or social sciences. One goal, for example, is for students and scholars of engineering working on, say, robotics or climate science, to also acquire knowledge in another field that helps them to understand the social implications of their work. In the opposite direction, courses on data science for students in the humanities and social sciences are also available and have proven to be popular, Tanaka said.
To further support such research, Waseda also needs to provide facilities that are equal to the task, Tanaka noted. One project with that aim is the renovation of the student learning center at the center of campus, which will be modified to include “learning commons.” These spaces, he says, will have, for example, large screens onto which students and researchers can project their work in small group settings. The Wi-Fi network has also been extended to all buildings.
On a larger scale, he added, the university will build new facilities on its nearby Nishiwaseda Campus, which is home to departments in engineering and the sciences. Several buildings have been torn down and the new buildings, to be completed by November 2032, will contain up-to-date facilities and be designed to be more environmentally friendly.
Additionally, back on the Waseda Campus, the school is constructing a new Building 9. Its purpose, according to the university, is to create “an environment with state-of-the-art learning spaces and an area that promotes open innovation.” It will serve as home to the Faculty of Education and Integrated Arts and Sciences, and is being designed with crossing disciplinary boundaries in mind.
Finally, Tanaka added, recalling Okuma’s call for independence of scholarship, Waseda continues to encourage not only “top-down” research but also “bottom-up” research. He cites as examples the work being done on diamond-based power systems by professor Hiroshi Kawarada (see accompanying article) and an effort led by professor Takao Aoki to develop a gate-type quantum computer.
This article is sponsored by Waseda University.
Waseda University
Address: 1-104 Totsukamachi, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 169-8050
Phone: +81-3-3202-5454
E-mail: [email protected]
URL: https://www.waseda.jp/top/en/
