Tokyo Tech Glocal Summer School 2022 focuses on improving workplaces for women

Tokyo Tech's Glocal Summer School gathered for another intensive online session of lectures and groupwork three hours a day on September 12 and 13. The program, launched in 2019 and held twice a year in spring and summer, brought together master's, professional master's, and doctoral students from Tokyo Tech, students from other universities, and working professionals to discuss ways to achieve better workplaces for women under the theme of "Design for Humanity — Women Work."

To kick things off, Tokyo Tech Associate Professor Hironao Kaneko, the coordinator of the program, gave a short talk about the concept of the Tokyo Tech Glocal Summer School. Participants then acquainted themselves with one another through some lighthearted activities. Group members shared self-introduction sheets, displayed their papercraft creations, and talked about their professions and fields of study. They then moved to Zoom breakout rooms to discuss the prepared materials regarding problems at women's workplaces. A representative summarized the group discussions to other participants, after which all members regrouped to continue open discussions about this important issue.

In the second part of Day 1, participants were treated to two special lecturers. The first was by Tomoe Utsumi, managing executive officer and chief diversity officer at The Norinchukin Bank. She spoke about the need for management to promote gender equality and inclusiveness in companies. She also introduced similarities and differences between local companies and firms outside Japan.

In the second lecture, Professor Miho Kamitsukue from the Faculty of Contemporary Law at Tokyo Keizai University explained the importance of protecting women's personal information at the workplace. To wrap up the session, Utsumi and Kamitsukue participated in a Q&A session and discussions with students.

After the lectures, the groups convened again virtually to decide on the theme of their final presentation, and utilized a number of communication tools during their group work for the remainder of the day.

On the morning of Day 2, students gathered to put the final touches on their presentations, which included posters and 3D models. At the culmination of the event, Tokyo Tech Vice President for Teaching and Learning Manabu Kanda participated in the judges' panel to listen to the final presentations. Each group had ten minutes to share their ideas and respond during the online Q&A session, after which the judges selected the winner of the Glocal Prize.

This summer's winners were Matthias Gusenbauer, a doctoral student in Mathematical and Computing Science, Kiyoharu Kajiyama, a doctoral student in Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Siyu Gu, a master's student in Social and Human Sciences, all from Tokyo Tech. The group of three proposed a flextime system that makes work life for women easier. Kanda noted that all three presentations were interesting and difficult to rank, but among them, the winning group proposed a comprehensive solution to the problem at hand.

In his closing comments, Kanda once again praised the solutions created by participants of the program, and highlighted the importance of students' proposals to common problems in the world.

Abstracts and summaries of the final presentations will be published on the Glocal Spring School and Glocal Summer School program website.