TIER: Inaugural 2012 TiROP and TKT CAMPUS Asia Summer Programs

Professor Tom Hope and participating students in a Summer School session

Students presented their research projects at Tokyo Tech

Commemorative photograph of students, tutors, professors, and staff taken at the closing ceremony of the program.

Tokyo Institute of Technology (Tokyo Tech) launched the Tokyo Institute of Technology International Education and Research (TIER) Program in June 2012.

TIER represents a new initiative by Tokyo Tech to cultivate global techno-scientific leaders through a cooperative network of leading science and technology universities in Asia, Europe, and the United States. TIER consists of two closely related summer programs: the Tokyo Institute of Technology International Research Opportunities Program (TiROP) and the TKT CAMPUS Asia Consortium.

The inaugural meeting of the TiROP and TKT CAMPUS Asia Summer Programs took place from June to August 2012. Twenty-two undergraduate and master's degree students from designated partner universities, including MIT, Brown University, Paris Tech, Tsinghua University, and KAIST participated in coursework and conducted individual research.

The summer programs provide visiting students with the opportunity to carry out short-term research and be a part of a Tokyo Tech professor's laboratory. Most students also took Summer School English language lecture-based courses on Japanese culture and/or science and technology in contemporary Japan. These programs offer a new model for science and technology exchanges.

To support the participating students from around the world, academic advisors from both Tokyo Tech and the partner universities were in close communication regarding the Study and Research Plans of exchange students. They also provided academic and research guidance from pre-arrival through to post-departure periods.

Among the contemporary classes offered to visiting students were Advanced Technology at Tokyo Tech, which included tours of factories run by Sony, Riken and Mitsubishi Chemistry, as well as Modern Japan and Survival Japanese.

The TIER Program supports not only inbound students but also outbound Tokyo Tech exchange students under the framework of either a summer program or a three-to-twelve month exchange.

Further information about the TIER Program:
TKT CAMPUS Asia Consortium http://www.ipo.titech.ac.jp/campusasia/
TiROP http://www.ipo.titech.ac.jp/tirop/