Creating Value School at Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology
Led by Youji Kohda, the Creating Value School is part of the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) and aims at developing programs on creating value. The JAIST Creating Value Program, opened in April 2022, is offered at the Tokyo Satellite of JAIST for working professional students. Monthly, the students read books and journal papers related to creating value, using an active learning method called Learning Through Discussion (LTD). We believe that critical reading skills of literature would be the fundamental basis for creating value. Currently, more than a dozen doctoral and master’s students are actively participating in the monthly activities.
Kobe University Value School as an Interdisciplinary Education Core By Hiroki Tsuruta
Kobe University Value School (V.School), interdisciplinary research and education organization in Kobe University, is established at 2020. V.School is with two missions. The first one is to explore the concept of value creation itself and create a new academic discipline for value creation. The second is to systematize various concepts related to this academic discipline and to develop and implement educational programs for value creation. All professors and students of Kobe University can participate in V.School. As of 2024, about 30 professors and 200 students joining to the V.School. They study value creation systemically from philosophical, natural scientific, and humanistic-sociological perspectives in the lectures. The lectures are based on the basic picture of value creation that the team has found (Value Creation Square, Fig.). The students then experience value creation through various Project Based Learning.
The Value Creation Square describes the phenomenon of value creation as follows. “Problem” is extracted from the “Expectation” of people, communities, and societies. The issues necessary to solve the “Problem” are identified and “Solution” are obtained. The important thing is that if the “Result” or outcome provided by the solution meets the “Expectation”, then Satisfaction is given, and this is where Value is expressed.
There is a very important point when conducting value creation education at universities. When defining the “Problem” to be solved based on the “Expectation” of people and society, it is not possible to fully grasp the problem from the perspective of a single discipline. The “Problem” faced by people and society has a complex structure that is related to a variety of causal factors. Therefore, in order to grasp the essence of the “Problem,” it is necessary to look at society itself from the viewpoints of various specialized fields. Once “Problem” is defined, a variety of knowledge is needed to formulate the problem and devise a solution. In Japan, the perspectives and knowledge of various fields of expertise are called Convergence knowledge in solving problems to create value. The V.School is a core for interdisciplinary research and education that brings together the perspectives and knowledge of various disciplines. The following is a brief introduction to some of the many programs offered at the V.School.
- School Salon: Kobe University V.School is like a pot where different perspectives and knowledge are gathered. The various knowledge put into the pot is mixed and combined under the theme of discussion to transform it into Convergence Knowledge. In the Salon, many students and researchers can gain new perspectives and insights. The topics discussed range from the familiar to the more academic. For example, discussion topics range from social issues such as the merits and demerits of DX and AI technologies for future society, the reality of well-being, the importance of food communities, and the essence of entrepreneurship education, to more academic issues such as the limits of economics, reason and irrationality, art and education, etc. The discussions at the Salon have led to new interdisciplinary research and projects.
- Future and Energy: This is a fieldwork-based learning program that explores how to frame issues that create value for society while recognizing the connection between “Expectation” and “Problem” in the Value Creation Square. In this program, participants will examine the future of society and energy supply and consumption in the state of Hawaii, a leading energy problem area in the United States. After lectures by Kobe University professors on the big picture of carbon neutrality, equality and equity, etc., participants will visit Hawaii to learn not only technical knowledge related to energy, but also cultural and human background through lectures and fieldwork by University of Hawaii at Manoa professors and activists living in Hawaii. Students will acquire not only natural science perspectives, but also humanities and social science perspectives, and experience the creation of Convergence knowledge.
- Entrepreneurship Program for Resilient Society (eRES) and Value Verification Fieldwork Program (V2F): This is also a fieldwork-based learning program to experience the definition of “Problem” from “Expectation” in the Value Creation Square, and the verification of the value of the “Solution”. This is a program to experience the definition of “Problem” from “Expectation” and the verification of the value of “Solution” in the Value Creation Square. Japan is a country that experiences various complex disasters such as major earthquakes, tsunamis, and floods every year. The eRES program will provide participants with an opportunity to learn about the damage caused by the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake 30 years ago and the Great East Japan Earthquake 13 years ago, as well as the “Expectation” of people and communities in these areas and how they can be “resilient” and “recoverable” in the face of such disasters. The program will also provide participants with a first-hand experience of how people and communities in these areas have achieved “recovery” by solving “Problem” while maintaining “Expectation” for the future. In the V2F program, participants are expected to think about how to prevent major complex disasters from occurring in the future and how to develop businesses and initiatives that enable sustainable development as “Solution”. In the V2F program, participants will once again go out into the field in various regions of Japan and solicit feedback from local people to verify that the “Solution” they have devised will produce “Result” that will bring satisfaction to society. These programs have been jointly developed not only by professors of Kobe University V.School, but also by professors of Miyagi University, Tohoku University, Niigata University, Kyoto University and Kwansei Gakuin University, and are being implemented with the support of the Japan Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology.
- Future Insight – Ideathon Workshop: This program is designed to give participants a light-hearted experience of the thinking process in value creation, taking them from “Expectation” to “Problem” and from “Solution” to “Result” in the Value Creation Square, This program is designed to give participants a light-hearted experience of the thinking process in value creation, taking them from “Expectation” to “Problem” and from “Solution” to “Result” in the Value Creation Square. Special emphasis is placed on the acquisition of Design Thinking, which is considered to be a new method for gathering requirements prior to software development in the engineering field. This program focuses on the process of collective knowledge formation, and participants will experience the process of problem discovery and idea generation by diverse actors through workshops.
The V.School is also developing an educational program to learn a way of viewing and thinking from a bird’s eye viewpoint and objective perspective. From now on, the V.School’s team is planning to spread the value-creation education systematized by Kobe University to students at universities and high schools other than Kobe University. For more information, visit Kobe University Value School (V.School).
Value Research Center, Doshisha University, Kyoto
Chaired by Philip Sugai, the Value Research Center is dedicated to researching and developing a system for measuring, monitoring, assessing, and reporting on the value creation and destruction impacts that organizations have on various stakeholder groups, including (1) the organization itself, (2) its shareholders or owners, (3) customers, (4) employees, (5) partners, (6) the society in which it operates, and (7) the planet. This year, the Value Research Center team presented the topic of Empowering SMEs: Blockchain & AI for Sustainable Stakeholder Value at the Science Summit for the United Nations General Assembly: https://sciencesummit2024.