2020 New Year Greetings
New Year's address from President for 2020.
January 1, 2020
Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology Chief Hiroyuki Ohno
Happy New Year. I hope that you are all having a peaceful New Year. Thank you for your continued support for Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology this year.
Last year, the era name changed to Reiwa, and I think everyone was feeling renewed. This year is Reiwa 2, and it looks like it will be a year of change and leaps. Last year, the Graduate School of Agriculture and the Faculty of Faculty of Engineering were reorganized, and the Graduate School of Joint Doctoral Program for Sustainability Research, which was established in cooperation with Tokyo University of Foreign Studies and the University of Electro-Communications, was started, which triggered a dramatic advancement in the educational environment. With the start of the Outstanding Graduate WISE Program in Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, education at our university is also steadily changing. The evaluation results for our university in 2018 were also found to be "progressing smoothly toward achieving Medium-term Plan," but we cannot just be passive and accept the evaluation, and we must actively promote the unique characteristics of our university. For example, in August last year, we declared "TUAT Plastic Reduction 5R Campus," which adds "Research," which is unique to universities, as one of the action goals as part of environmental pollution countermeasures such as reusing and recycling plastics, and shows a clear direction that many of the research being conducted at our university will contribute to solving this problem.
This year marks the fifth year of the third Medium-term Plan, and we will make further efforts to achieve the four strategic goals we set at the beginning. Namely, we will promote 1) strengthening cutting-edge research capabilities, 2) globalization of education and research, 3) industry-academia collaboration with an eye toward internationalization, and 4) fostering highly innovative human resources. Although the cuts in operating subsidies faced by national university corporations are a serious problem, we will make further efforts to acquire external funds so as not to cause a decline in the quality of education and research due to this cut, make our doctoral programs more attractive, increase opportunities for international co-authored papers and overseas dispatch of graduate students, and increase the number of international students accepted, in order to achieve our goals.
The mission of the university is to provide students with quality education. The foundations for Organization for the Advancement of Education and Global Learning 's activities have been almost established, so we hope that this year will be a year of success for the Institute. As we are a research graduate university, it is not easy to improve education while maintaining our research capabilities, but in order to achieve our goal, we will review the way faculty and staff work and proceed with system reform. We will pool our wisdom, devise solutions, and do our best to improve the system so that students are satisfied with our education and campus life, and we faculty and staff can work with a sense of fulfillment.
We will continue to work to create an organization where each faculty member feels that they are supporting the university, and we will do our utmost to make the university even better than before, so we appreciate your continued cooperation and support. I wish you all the best in the New Year and hope that the university and you will grow together.
