About Tokyo Tech

Tamachi Campus

Tokyo Tech's Tamachi Campus is located in Minato City in the center of Tokyo, in the immediate vicinity of Tamachi Station. It is home to the Tokyo Tech High School of Science and Technology, the Graduate School of Innovation Management, the Career Advancement Professional School, and the Tokyo Tech Campus Innovation Center, which is also home to satellite offices of other national universities. The site is not large, but it has a sports field and a gymnasium and is full of youthful energy. The history of the Tamachi Campus begins in 1924 with the campus witnessing several transitions and administrative transfers of the present-day Tokyo Tech High School of Science and Technology over the years.

Tamachi Campus, aerial view

Tamachi Campus, aerial view

The History of the Tokyo Tech High School Science and Technology

Prewar high school in Tamachi
Prewar high school in Tamachi

In 1886 the forerunner of the Tokyo Tech High School of Science and Technology was established in today's Ginza as the affiliated training school of the Tokyo Commercial School (forerunner of Hitotsubashi University). The high school was transferred to the Tokyo Vocational School, Tokyo Tech's forerunner, in 1890. After several name changes and transfers, it moved to Tamachi in 1924 when the school was reorganized as an affiliated school of the Tokyo Kotokogei School.

In 1949 Tokyo Tech was reorganized to comply with the new postwar educational system. In April 1951 the Tokyo Tech High School (forerunner of the Tokyo Tech High School of Science and Technology) was established after the merger of two then-affiliated schools of Chiba University into Tokyo Tech. The high school offered one program, the Regular Program. In May of the same year, the Tokyo Kotokogakuin was transferred to the Tokyo Tech High School as the school's Advanced Program, and began providing industrial know-how and technical education in a two-year night program to young workers who had already graduated from high school.

Tokyo Tech High School of Science and Technology
Tokyo Tech High School
of Science and Technology

The origin of the Regular Program can be traced back to the departments of the two original schools: the Department of Mechanics of the affiliated training school of the Tokyo Commercial School established in 1886 and the Department of Telecommunications of the Tokyo Kotokogei School (Tokyo Higher School of Industrial Design, the forerunner of the Faculty of Engineering at Chiba University) established in 1943. The program evolved over time to meet the needs of society. During the Meiji Period the Regular Program provided practical education in commerce and industry. During the Taisho Period it cultivated woodcrafters and metal workers, and later in the Showa Period the program produced industrial and telecommunications technology engineers. The Advanced Program, a school in itself, was established in 1899 as one of the affiliated schools of the Tokyo Technical School, the forerunner of Tokyo Tech. The program initially had two departments, the Department of Metal Engineering and the Department of Woodworking. The original aim of the Advanced Program was to educate day workers at night in order to cultivate mechanics and engineers with the knowledge and skills to increase their social status and advance Japan's industrial base.

The History of the Tokyo Tech High School of Science and Technology

Tamachi Campus Today

The high school marked its 120th anniversary in 2005 and was reorganized as the Tokyo Tech High School of Science and Technology in April of the same year. Today the high school has one department, the Department of Science and Technology, and each grade has 200 students. It is Japan's only national high school specializing in science and technology and emphasizing practical education through experiments and on-site training grounded in its well-developed science and technology education. In 2002 the Japanese government endorsed it as a Super Science High School (SSH) and the school set to work developing an advanced curriculum focusing on science and mathematics. The school also offers visionary science and technology education in cooperation with Tokyo Tech.

Although the Advanced Program was closed in 2010 after providing night classes to workers for well over a hundred years, the Graduate School of Innovation Management, established in April 2005, offers a wide range of evening classes to a large number of working-adult students. Additionally, the Career Advancement Professional School, established in April 2009, further embraces this long tradition by offering similar classes. It strives to meet the lifelong learning needs of today's workforce through its evening and Saturday graduate-level classes.

A typical day at the Tamachi Campus ends with high school students crossing paths with working-adult students as the former group goes home for the day and the latter passes through the Main Gate to begin their professional and continuing education classes. It is a time-honored scene at Tokyo Tech's Tamachi Campus.

Tamachi Campus Today

Read More

 Tokyo Institute of Technology 130th Anniversary in 2011outer(Japanese)

 100-Year History of Tokyo Institute of Technology (Japanese)

 Tokyo Institute of Technology Chronicle, May 1980, Nos. 398 & 444 (Japanese)

 Tokyo Tech High School of Science of Technology 100th Anniversary (Japanese)

Contact

Public Relations Division, Tokyo Institute of Technology

Email pr@jim.titech.ac.jp