Mr. Saisho of the Dragon Cherry Blossoms and the ‘Dream Award 2010’ by Watami Co., Ltd.

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On December 21st, I posted a column titled ‘The Dragon Cherry Blossoms (in Japanese) of Dhaka – They Did it Again’, which I wrote on 20th.

The main character of this story, Mr. Saisho, passed the screening of the ‘Dream Award 2010’ (in Japanese) from so many candidates to remain among the 5 finalists, and on 21th, the day after I drafted the above column, the final speech competition took place at Hibiya Public Auditorium.  I heard about this from Mr. Saisho himself because I met him the day before, on 20th near Hibiya, where the event took place.
 
I was told by the organizer that the speech by the wonderful 5 finalists were all very moving, but surprisingly Mr. Saisho won both the ‘Best Watami Dream Award’ and ‘Special Watami Award’ (in Japanese).  Mr. Saisho’s presentation can be seen on the web (in Japanese) within the timeframe of  01:57:55-02:12:33 and the announcement of the winners during 02:19:15-02:25:30.

A transcript of the interview of Mr. Saisho (in Japanese) is on the web, too.

The Dragon Cherry Blossoms is an outstanding project in terms of its scope, the big gap between now and the goal, and the strong ability to take actions to carryout the plans.

The impact of this project is huge because they, together with the youths of the poor village in Bangladesh, actually proved in real life that a big dream can become true.

I sent an e-mail to Mr. Saisho right away to say ‘I am proud of you.  But let’s be careful not to be too flattered by those series of good things that keep happening recently.’  The next day, he sent me a reply: ‘Yes, I will keep telling myself that praise is the biggest trap!’.  Good!

He will leave for Dahka on December 26th.

I wrote an e-mail to him: ‘Have a nice holiday season in Dhaka. Take care’.

The Dragon Cherry Blossoms of Dhaka – They Did it Again!

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This is another entry about Mr. Saisho (in Japanese), a Waseda University student. He’s been on leave from school for two years working in Bangladesh. I’ve written about him several times here.  Mr. Saisho has been working on a great project that brings hope to a poor village in Bangladesh. The project uses e-education to assist and empower youth in preparing for entrance exams for top Bangladesh universities. Preparation for these exams is usually class-driven; Mr Saisho and his colleagues are helping to lesson obstacles for the poorer. 

Two students succeeded in the exam. The news  was reported on the local newspaper under a bold heading.  Japanese media has been covering this news as well.  Mr. Saisho and his friends started this project two yeas ago and later gave it an ambitious name: ‘Grameen Change Maker Program’.

What happened to the other students?  Well, I received a follow up e-mail from Mr. Saisho yesterday.  According to his message, two more students passed the exams.

 "Dr. Kurokawa,

Here is more good news.  Two male students passed the entrance exam to the Teachers College of Comilla University, the 5th best national university in Bangladesh!!!

Below is the summary to date.

Accepted to University of Dhaka, the No.1 National University:
Bhuran Uddian Helal (male)
1,276th of 36,000 applicants

Accepted to Jagannath University, the No.3 National University:
Jaren Akter (female)
2,000th of 70,000 applicants

Accepted to Comilla University (Teachers College), the No.5 National University:
Muhamad Hossian (male)
480th of 40,000 applicants

Accepted to Comilla University (Teachers College), the No.5 National University:
MD Jafor Ahmed (male)
270th of 70,000 applicants

Each student passed with high scores!

Here, people are praising the achievement by calling it a ‘miracle in Hamchar village’

Now, people are curious to know more about the Dragon Cherry Blossoms e-Education method ? to learn the secret of how the village high school students succeeded in passing the university entrance exams with such high scores.

Sincerely,
Atsuyoshi Saisho”

For all those elderly who look down upon our youth, what do you think of this? Youths today are not in as bad of a place as you think. They are actually reliable and know exactly what they are doing.

Just giving them a small nudge from behind, like encouraging them to take a leave of absence from school and go abroad, is enough to make them go and see the new broad world, to find issues, and to challenge the issues bravely.

I advise youths to not be afraid of failures.  Have ambition and courage to challenge high goals. Try, and when you fail, learn your lessons from your failure and try again.  This is the key.  In short, it is ‘No Failure, no success’.

It is this young population that we want and that we are always looking for.  Are they not the human asset – the human resource whom the society, companies, and Japan as a nation need?  They are what we would call the ‘nails that stick out (Deru Kui)’, people who are not restricted to the commonsense of the Japanese society.

This is the reason why I so strongly recommend taking leave of absence from school.   We should give the youth opportunities to be aware of their possibilities.  As I always say, Japan is only a part of the wide world.

For you, readers, I would like to remind you that there are so many ways of helping such youth.  I ask for your warm support.

Qatar Foundation Annual Research Forum

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After finishing the panel at Tunis, I left the hotel in late afternoon.  Arriving at Doha, Qatar via Dubai at 6:30 am, I checked in at Sheraton again.  I was here this past June (Ref.1), too.  This time, it was right when Qatar won the 2022 World Cup Bid.

My travel was by the invitation of Qatar Foundation Annual Research Forum which will be held for two days.  The Qatar Foundation  (Ref.1) is one of the major institutions of Qatar focused on development of good education. Her Highness herself is the devoted driver of its activities, some of which have already produced great results. For example,  the research laboratories of Cornell University, Carnegie Mellon University, Texas A&M University are all built on the huge premise of the Foundation.
 
Because this was their first Forum, the main purpose was to introduce the Qatar Foundation to the world.  The Foundation attracted many participants this year.  This country is very young, to begin with.  And the nation is also very dedicated to human resource development, with the initiatives of the Qatar University.  They are keen to education because they know that, although they are rapidly accumulating wealth as one of the major energy exporting nations of the world of gas and oil, the final resource this small island nation will be able to depend on for its future is the human resource.

Qatar is also a nation that protects and supports culture and art.  A good example of this is the Museum of Islamic Art, which I have spoken about before on this site.

The Forum opened at 9am with the speech of Her Highness, the Queen.  Between the programs, I enjoyed reading posters (especially those by the students).  I was also a jury member that presided over the presentations of Biomedical Science researches. Dr. Elias Zerhouni （former Director of NIH）, Dr. Peter Agre (a Nobel laureate of chemistry for his discovery of water channel) and Dr. Monsef Saloui（the head of GSK, RD）were also part of this jury. Elias and Moncef are my good friends, but I have not worked with Dr. Agre before. I did, however, know about his work, and had listened to several of his lectures. The forum was full of young energy.  I was particularly impressed by the existence of many active women.

In the evening, I visited Ambassador Moji at the Japan embassy in Qatar with President Tsuciya and several people of Tsuchiya Corporation (Mr. Nishida, a very good Arabic speaker whom I saw at the embassy in Abu Dhabi was there also.)  Then, we visited the residence of former Ambassador of Qatar to Japan, H.E. Reyad Ali Al-Ansari who recently returned to Qatar after 9 years of service in Japan and invited us for dinner.  It is nice to experience expansion of human networks like this.  H.E. Al-Ansari said that his son studied in the U.S. and is currently working in the oil business in Qatar.  However, he seemed to be not so approving of his daughter’s studying abroad.

We paid a brief visit to the president of administration of Her Highness the next day at the head office of Qatar Foundation. It was unfortunately brief because our schedule was packed in the afternoon with many sessions on science policy etc.  We need to have more Japanese researchers and youths participate in such occasions. It is important to promote the exchange of young people.

The result of the selection was announced at the evening reception.  From our group, the award was given to a study done on defective hearing that identified the responsible DNA and showed that the deficiency was caused by the malfunctioning of its hair cells.  The project was very nicely  researched and the researcher answered each question with confidence.  Her boss, the head of the administrative office at her hospital (who also happened to be a women), looked very happy.  This head was also a very gifted and able person whom I truly enjoyed talking for some time with.  I was seated at the same table as the professors of MIT, UCLA, and the Dean of the local Texas A&M research laboratory.  We quite enjoyed the conversation over dinner because we had so many common topics to talk about.  I had to leave during the dinner to catch the 22:50 airplane for Abu Dhabi, a forty minute flight.
 
Whenever I am exposed to the energy and motivation of young people, I always become eager to help.  I also look forward to seeing more exchanges carried out between Japan and Qatar.

To Tunis: Japan-Arab Economic Conference

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In the evening of December10th, I left Narita via Dubai to Tunis in order to attend the 2nd Japan-Arab Economic Conference held in Tunis on the 11th and 12th.  The arrival time at Tunis was shortly after noontime.

I felt a cool breeze as I left the airport, and I thought that Tunis was a nice place.  Since I had seen H.E. Hatano, former ambassador to UAE, in Dubai, I headed directly to the Carthage remains from the airport.  I enjoyed a nice tour with Mr. Ohashi, a long time expert of middle eastern business of Mitsui & Co. He kindly guided me around with a full explanation of the sites (he is quite informed about this area, and said that he recently stayed in Tunis for a week…)

Here, we encountered Mr. Ohata, Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry, and delegates.

After stopping by at several sight seeing spots, we arrived at Sidi Bou Said (Ref.1), our final destination.  It was a lovely old town with white walls and beautiful blue windows and doors.  We had tea at the so called oldest coffee shop in the world, relaxing, as the time went slowly by.  Tunis is in the Mediterranean Culture zone, both geographically and historically.  Time pass slowly here.  I must admit that a workaholic lifestyle, competing only for higher GDPs, has some problems.  Here, you can feel the long history of culture.

The reception was held at Ramada Hotel, the venue of the conference and our accommodation.  About 300 people came for this conference from Japan.  The head of the Japanese delegation was Mr. Okuda of Toyota, and I had the honor of seeing and greeting many leaders of Japanese business.  Mr. Maehara, Minister of Foreign Affairs, also participated this year.  I had an impression that many Japanese from business sector came to the reception.

The conference hall was packed the next day.  It must have been hard to keep on schedule since there were many different sorts of people who gave speeches.  It started with the Japanese Ministers Maehara and Ohata, and then the Ministers of Arabian countries and many important people gave speeches.  I imagine that it was hard work for the secretariat. There were a number of collaborative projects were signed and announced, giving hope for a series of of good outcomes in coming years.

I tried to illustrate Japanese activities to the participants by briefly explaining relationships of Japan and Arabs. In these illustrations I included an introduction of the STS Forum, the panels on education, human resource development, science, and technology.  After having a slightly late lunch, I packed my things and headed for the airport.  I arrived at Doha via Dubai early in the morning of 12th.

Somehow, this travel was quite a busy one.

Welcoming Ambassador Roos to my Keio SFC Class

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I assume that you are familiar with my Keio SFC course through my reports on this web site as well as through the on-line videos. 

For the December 8th class, we welcomed U.S. Ambassador Roos (IMPACT Japan posting of 2010/12/08) as our guest.  Because this was such a rare occasion, the Keio SFC administration arranged to open the auditorium at the θbuilding,  thereby extending the opportunity to all students.   President Seike, as well as the Deans of Keio SFC, Drs. Murai, Kokuryo, Agawa, and Tokuda also came to listen to this lecture. NHK came to report on this, too.

To say a few words about Ambassador Roos’ background, he earned his degrees at Stanford University and Stanford Law School, and was the CEO of a Silicon Valley-based law firm specializing in intellectual property law before accepting the ambassadorship, and has a great interest in entrepreneurship.  So, I decided to have a dialogue style session with H.E. Roos focusing on the theme of entrepreneurship.  Since the auditorium was huge, I asked my students beforehand to prepare one question they each would like to ask Ambassador Roos. I also asked about 20 students to get on the stage with him.
 
Additionally, we set up a big screen behind us to show twitter entries from the students  in the hall during the session.

I think the session turned out to be a nice one, reflecting well the character and personality of Ambassador Roos.  After our dialogue, Dr. William Saito, my partner of this class (we do this together because we are both frequently away for overseas travel…) hosted a Q&A between the Ambassador and the students.  The first question was asked by a surprise guest (IMPACT Japan Posting of 2010.11.22) Ms. Reina Otsuka of Ecotwaza. This session will be uploaded on the video site of my class soon, I hope.

After giving the lecture, the Ambassador stopped by our Innovation Lab.  He seemed to be quite interested.  I hope that several years from now, some good results will emerge from here and directly relate to Silicon Valley.

A part of my session with Ambassador Roos was broadcasted two days later on NHK-BS television program at 10 pm on December 10th.  Unfortunately, I was unable to see this because I was set to leave for Tunis the same evening….

I am quite positive that this was one of the most unforgettable, wonderful, and stimulating days of the participating students’ lives.

From Dubai: Global Agenda Council

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On November 27th I headed for Dubai to participate in the Global Agenda Council (Ref.1,2) of the World Economic Forum.  Though a majority of the participants were in other Councils, about 20 people came from Japan including Drs. Heizo, Takenaka, Akihiko Tanaka, and Yoko Ishikura .  The program spanned 4 days, with 3 of those days having tightly packed schedules. Unlike past forums this was arranged with precise detail. The reason for this was because the objective was to recommend how to create networks for Global Risk Response for all kinds of anticipated risks in the world.

Since I was the Chair of the Japan Council, my schedule was packed.  Chairs were asked to arrive one day earlier to be present at the overall briefing.  There was no free time. I had to understand how everything worked, how to move the system, attend Briefing sessions, participate in other important Councils, etc.  My role was very demanding in a way.

The forum occurred at the same time that North Korea emerged as an issue. Because of this we had to be more sensitive about things, which made me feel more tired than usual.

However, this situation was also a good opportunity.  Particularly, being able to exchange views with Councils of China and Korea on political issues, economic climate, growth of China was a rewarding experience.  The Chinese Council Chair was Mr. He Yafei, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, and the Korean Council Chair was Dr. Moon Chung-In (Ref.1), Professor of Politics at Yonsei University whom I have known for long time.  Having discussion not only with the Council members, but also with those two Chairs and hearing suggestive words and genuine thoughts and feelings was truly something I appreciated.

The reception in the evening of the second day was held at the terrace of Burj Khalifa Tower, the tallest building in the world.  Gazing at the soaring tower, seeing the view, meeting people…was quite a nice experience.

The third day of the meeting was BBC World News Debate, a wonderful 70 minutes discussion hosted by Mr. Nik Gowing, the well known anchor person of BBC.  I think you will have an opportunity to see this on television sometime in the future.  The participants included Mr. Kevin Rudd, former prime minister of Australia and minister of foreign affairs of current administration, Ambassador He of China, Ms. Malini　Mehra, Ms. Louise Arbour of International Crisis Group, and Mr. James Cameron of Climate Change Capital.  I was particularly impressed with Mr. Rudd’s 20 seconds spontaneous speech to people behind the television camera.  Ability to take such flexible actions is one of the qualities required of good politicians.

One of the lessons I learned during these 3 days is the importance of making visual as possible the problems we are discussing.  At the Design Council, I had a glimpse of the wonderful works of Professor Toshiko Mori of Harvard University Design School.  I understand that Design Council and Innovation Council members helped problem solving processes of other Councils, and the results were fantastic.

Now, we all have lots of homework to do and issues to be addressed for the coming year.

It was a full, packed 4 days with lots of learning.  I left Dubai and arrived safely at Narita on the evening of December 2nd.

Another Achievement by the Dragon Cherry Blossoms

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Dragon Cherry Blossoms  (Ref.1, 2, 3) (Ref.2 is in Japanese) is a project in Bangladesh that helps youth in poor villages pursue great dreams. Their goal is high, and thought to have been impossible to achieve.  Mr. Saisyo of Waseda University, who is currently taking a leave of absence from school, is leading this project.

His activities were reported in the November 30th issue of Nikkei newspaper as the special feature titled: ‘Challenge’.

I was in Dubai when the article appeared, but I had already been familiar with the story since Mr. Saisyo informed me.  People may congratulate Waseda University as having done a good job again.  But this is not the University’s work. This is the result of hard work by Mr. Saisyo and his friends.  It would seem that taking a leave of absence from school  (Ref.1) for and going through many struggles might have worked positively toward this achievement.

As you see, encouraging students to not be afraid to challenge is one of the great missions of the universities in this global age. Indeed, these are the future leaders of the world. Such individuals are those who possess the potential to become human capital. They will have great impacts on society and the world.
 
Upon my return to Japan, I received good news from Mr. Saisyo:

“Dear Dr. Kurokawa,

This is Dragon Cherry Blossoms.  I am pleased to report to you that Jellen Acter, an 18 years old female student was accepted to the second best national university in Bandladesh, Jagannath University!!  This is the first case where a female student has passed the exam! 

She scored 2,038th among 70,000 students who sat for the exam!! 

A female student in this village who studied on e-Education qualified for a distinguished university equivalent to Hitotsubashi University in Japan!

This is the 2nd miracle after Heral!!  Wow, 2,038nd of 70,000!

Again, local people are in great excitement. “Unbelievable!” is their common reaction.

Today, a new role model is born in our Islam village, a new hope for the majority of female students whose options are very limited in planning their life.

After Heral, Jellen is the second case in this nation to pass the university entrance exam through study on the e-learning program. 

Jellen Acter, thank you for the revolution!

This is Saisyo reporting from Bangladesh.”

I sense great enthusiasm in his report…..  For more information, please look at his new web site. (in Japanese)

This is one of the great examples of how adults may support youth who are generally regarded as being inwardly focused.  The idea is to help youth see the desires hidden deep in their hearts (Ref.1),  and give encouragement and warm support as they pursue their dreams.

This is the essence of education.

Since When Did Japanese Become Insular, Closed Minded People?

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Recently, I notice many comments being rapidly issued by media on the insular closed mindset of Japanese people. This surprises me.

Isn’t this strange?  What could it be a sign of?  The reason I feel this way is because a certain number of people including myself have been pointing this out from long time ago, with key words such as ‘Intellectually Isolated Country’ or ‘Cartels of the Mind’ (Ref.1 in Japanese) (Ref.2,3,4 in English)

Despite their serious thinking, didn’t people of distinguished positions sense this issue? Or perhaps they did not wish to admit that the problem existed?

I hear that the November 28th morning issue of Nikkei included a 1 page special report titled ‘Fading Existence (1)’ (by Mr. Yuzo Waki, Deputy Chief Editorial Writer) as part 3 of special feature ‘Japan in These 20 Years: Lessons to be Learned from Long Stagnation’.  Its sub-title was ‘Global Human Assets are Diminishing:  Silent Executives, Youths With Closed Minds'  (in Japanese).  A boxed article of an interview with Toyoo Gyohten, Tadashi Yamamoto, and Lee Howell, Managing Director of World Economic Forum is also on the same issue.  I was told that the Nikkei On-line show similar articles but access to them is not free of charge.  (By the way, I hear that this On-line edition was awarded some prize recently.  I wonder what is so new and wonderful about the Nikkei On-line?  I would like to know the reason why they received this award.)

However, the points they are making in these articles are correct.  I just posted the same discussion and recommendations on November 27th….

I can’t help feeling some sadness and disappointment in this phenomenon. Why is this happening so late and so suddenly?

 

Recommendation for Taking a Leave of Absence from School, AIESEC: An International Internship Support Organization, Support from a High Official of the Ministry of Education

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Japan’s insularity or closed mindset is now becoming so evident that we can no longer wait for social structure reform to resolve this problem.   Many media reports as well as opinions from various fields in the society continuously point out the seriousness of the Japanese closed, insular mindset.  This problem, however, is not new at all.

This way of seeing refers not only to the youths, but as well as to the adults.  While many intellectuals point to the students as being inwardly focused, I believe that parents have a strong influence, and therefore should be held accountable for passing on these unprogressive mindsets.

As Japan grew in economic strength and prosperity combined with the publication of  'Japan as Number One' , National pride also grew. The baby boomer and subsequent generations accustomed to this status had to adjust their attitudes into a more defensive stance as the Cold War ended in 1991 followed by the Japanese economic bubble bursting in 1999.  Not to mention the advent of the internet, globalization, a dynamic restructuring of 14 city banks, the bankruptcy of Yamaichi Securities, a skyrocketing national deficit and stagnating GDP.

Therefore, I suppose, current college students grew up without being given any sense about a positive economy. (in Japanese)

All of the things I’ve said so far are the same as what I have written here so many times.

For a change, let me introduce you to some examples of the wonderful activities of college students who took leave of absences from school (Ref.1,2,3,4,5). 

And here is my small report on AIESC, an international internship network run by college students.

However, I regret to say that there are millions of obstacles that must be overcome in order for these kinds of activities to flourish.  For example, in many private universities, they charge various fees of students even on leave.  From my point of view such conduct is deplorable.  Being supported while traveling and experiencing the world is taken for granted in other parts of the world. Such attitude makes Japan’s unwillingness to encourage international experience that much more evident. I ask all university related persons to be quick in crafting ways to stop these kind of disgraceful procedures.

Staggering economy is bad enough, but with high education fees combined, I must say that Japan is a nation that neglects future human assets.  We cannot expect any positive future for a nation like this.  Not only university administrations but Japanese government will also have to do a better job .

Just recently, I had an opportunity to see Japanese students from AIESEC Japan (sadly, this site is only in Japanese…), a Japanese branch of AIESEC the world wide student run organization working to promote international internships.  Now, we are trying to find how to empower their activities, make this organization known to people, to gain support.  Of course it goes without saying, companies will also gain a variety of great merits by providing support to such students’ activities.

If the website of AIESEC Japan is written in English as well as in Japanese, their activities will contain broader perspectives.  For instance, not only can they send students abroad, but they will also be able to offer international students internship opportunities at Japanese companies.  The problem is that the current system fails to take into account the needs of the counterparts.  We discussed this issue also in specific manners.

Recently a high official at the Ministry of Education (I won’t say the specific name) who I have once worked with started a blog (in Japanese).  From his blog I could see how he supported my ideas, or is helping students in his own way (Ref.1) ( both links are in Japanese).  I was thrilled to discover this.  He also gave a wonderful lecture (in English) at a recent meeting (in Japanese) that included much of his own thoughts. I was told that the lecture was well received by the audience for its originality and strong message, all very unlike typical government officials.  I would like to express my sincere gratitude to this official for supporting my views.

I am aware that there are many more people who understand and support my ideas besides people in the Ministry of Education, but on a whole, it seems that making policy takes more than understanding.  I do understand that there are many reasons and conditions particular to the posts they are in.

It must also be understood that another problem lies in the fact that educators in junior high schools, high schools, or universities are far from doing their best in nurturing talents for the global age(Ref.1,2, 3 in Japanese), (Ref.4,5 in English).  We must not forget that the trends of the world moves rapidly.

As for the argument on whether it is good or not that active officials write a blog, I think there is nothing wrong with it because the blog is a tool to express personal views.  It’s a way to interact with a diverse community, and besides, what they write on the blog is far from being a secret.

Keio SFC Class, Welcoming Two OGs

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For our Shonan Fujisawa Campus (SFC) class on November 17th, we welcomed as our guests two OGs of SFC: Ms. Maria Yogo and Ms. Naoko Tajima.

Ms. Yogo is working at Khalifa University in Abu Dhabi where I also serve as one of the board members.  She just arrived to Japan yesterday evening.

Ms. Naoko Tajima  is a young director whose current works are mainly TV commercials.

At the start of class, we played her portfolio reel, a short film that summarized her works. Watching her work created a nice atmosphere in class. .

Their self introductions impressed us by their very unique, difficult to imagine, careers.  With their aggressive, animated spirits and talents to make things happen, Ms. Yogo and Tajima are moving forward very steadily.

I am certain that their exciting narratives provided every student with inspiration and something to think about.

Good responses were also sent via twitter during the class.  Such a simultaneous, live, class makes it possible to share a good time together.
 
Because these two female guests followed last week’s SFC seniors, their stories appealed that much more to the students’ sense of reality.

Please enjoy their full stories on this video.