Under the auspices of Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST), Kyoto University has offered the Global Science Campus ELCAS ("Experienced-based Learning Course for Advanced Science") program to first- and second-year high school students since 2014. The program aims to foster outstanding intellectuals who will succeed on the global stage in the field of science and technology.
Among the 159 students taking basic-level courses for ELCAS from October 2014 through February 2015, 32 students were selected to go on to courses at advanced level. Here they joined laboratories of their interest and conducted their own research activities under the guidance of KU teaching staff from April through August 2015. Nineteen advanced courses were provided in 2015.
Some of the participating students received the award for excellence at the 2015 National Presentation Meeting for JST's "Fostering the Next Generation Leaders in Science and Technology" program. (Awardees are shown below.)
This award is given to outstanding presenters who represent the nationwide Global Science Campus program or JST's "Fostering the Next Generation Leaders in Science and Technology" program.
Awardees and presentation topics
Yasutomo Yushima and Kotaro Matsuoka: "Method to detect RFID tags using Boolean Compressed Sensing"
Supervisors: Associate Professor Kazunori Hayashi and Assistant Professor Megumi Kaneko of the Graduate School of Informatics
Assistants: Ryo Hayakawa and Riho Kawasaki, first-year Master's program students at the Graduate School of Informatics
Akemi Noguchi "Fluorescence characteristics of nanodiamond"
Supervisors: Professor Kiyotaka Miura and Associate Professor Yasuhiko Shimotsuma of the Graduate School of Engineering
Assistant: Naoki Agatsuma, first-year Master's student at the Graduate School of Engineering
Nanami Hirose: "Queen development and endoreduplication in a termite Reticulitermes speratus "
Supervisor: Professor Kenji Matsuura of the Graduate School of Agriculture
Assistant: Tomonari Nozaki, second-year Master's student at the Graduate School of Agriculture
Comment from a participating student
This Presentation Meeting gave us a valuable opportunity to interact with excellent junior and senior high school students as well as professors from across the country. I'm very pleased that we were able to improve the clarity and coherence of our presentations through those exchanges.
Participating in this meeting taught me a lot about what it takes to be a good presenter, such as how to describe my experiments to others, and how to deliver such information in English. I was able to learn things that I wouldn't have learned in school, for instance, how to explain to people in other fields about the results of my study and their implications, and how it benefits society. I also had to think of a way to communicate these points to a wider audience in a comprehensive way. Drawing on the valuable experiences I gained in the course of this program, I now aspire to be a researcher like the KU teaching staff who taught and guided me.
Related links
- Global Science Campus ELCAS ("Experienced-based Learning Course for Advanced Science")
http://elcas.kyoto-u.ac.jp/wordpress/ (in Japanese) - JST's Global Science Campus project for Fostering the Next Generation Leaders in Science and Technology
http://www.jst.go.jp/cpse/gsc/ (in Japanese)
