Hello everyone, it's your friendly teacher Hayato Ogawa unrelated to the Japanese drama, Extremely Inappropriate! It’s been a gray and dark winter here in Hakusanroku campus but the light at the end of the school year is upon us and it’s filled with new adventures and goals for the next school year! My background is in electrical engineering with programming and telecommunications. I enjoy designing, creating, fixing and tinkering.

 On Thursday, January 23rd, 2025, Tossa Mebusaya sensei and I held the final class in the Fundamentals of Business Management course. In the class students made their final business proposals. The proposals were a 3 to 5 minute pitch of an idea that would help develop a new awareness and help others have a better student life. The students have been working in teams from week 5 to bring awareness and resolve issues they have faced around and in school life.


The first group wanted to revise the process for requesting, acquiring and using the student discount for Japan Rail (JR) ticketing system. The target would help JR, students and the academic office staff who prepare the paperwork for this process. The current process is to acquire a student travel discount which is time consuming and frustrating. The students proposed a more direct and app-based solution and check system, all maintained in the JR ticket system. The app and check system has good security and user id confirmation checks to assure correct use by both student user and JR. This solution adds a new feature to the existing ticketing system and gates at JR by updating the check in check out system and creating a web application in conjunction with schools for ID checks and clearance for discount acquisitions. The students also proposed a strong revenue model and sustainable life cycle for the solution.

The second group brought awareness to the large amount of stink bugs in the area and on campus. This group’s proposed solution was a small robot that would incinerate the specific bug identified as a stink bug with a laser light source. With an interesting payment method where every time a stink bug is removed the user must pay per bug. With this revenue model it allows the homeowner or users to rent the robot from the company to in order to maintain a peaceful and stink free living space without the worry of stink bugs. 

The third group wanted to have more interaction with the cafeteria staff and the food preparation and consumption process. This group wanted to use the Gordon Ramsay tv show called Kitchen Nightmares show concept and have a culinary coach to come in to shake up the school menu. The students wanted to see how they could be involved in communicating interest, curiosity and familiar tastes to cafeteria staff and share ideas through food. What kind of new creations would be made. The students offered a workshop like experience to update and collaborate with the current kitchen staff of different offerings and themes. The revenue model is a onetime fee dependent on catering size of the school/company facility and cafeteria.

The fourth group wanted to tackle the issue of noise in the living areas or dormitories to alert and give friendly reminders to other tenants, of loud behavior or disruptive noises being generated accidentally. They came up with a small device to keep track of peak noise levels in individual rooms and let a central system know of issues and patterns while alerting the noise maker. The system and dataset are sold to the facility management company as a subscription service and as a rental for the sensor and monitoring system.

The fifth group wanted to resolve the issues on difficulty of reading blackboard notes, how to digitize them and, with the help of AI, decipher hard to read handwritten notes. Target users were the students and people who may have a disadvantage of seeing the blackboard due to seat position or eye condition. This business would sell a subscription to the academic facility and would be included in the digital media cost to students to aid everyone and have ease of access to tools to help with studying.

This type of business proposal is similar to the American tv show Shark Tank where contestants have a very limited time to concisely hit attractive and informative points to stakeholders and investors so they gain interest and confidence in investing in a product or service. It is important to hit key points and have an open area for investors to come back to schedule another meeting to discuss more details. 

Hayato Ogawa

Hello, this is Michihiro Hayashi, and I am in charge of the Engineering Design I course. Throughout the year, 1st year students have been working in this course with the goal of creating useful products for people. On Friday, January 24th, 2025, the students made their final project presentation. Each team conducted interviews with their target users to identify underlying issues and needs. Based on their findings, they developed devices to address these problems and presented their solutions.

 I would like to introduce each team’s projects.

【Hot Spring (Onsen) Facility Hime no Yu Team A: Ocket】
Ryotetsu Sano, Madoka Nakazawa, Kotori Mae and Pantawat Lapananrat

 The first team presented the Hot Spring Facility English Guide System.
 On Hakusanroku campus, there is an onsen facility called "Hime no Yu," which is used by students, local residents and tourists. Through interviews with the onsen staff, students discovered that many foreign visitors who come to Hime no Yu for the first time struggle to understand the admission fees, ticket purchasing process, and onsen etiquette. They also found that it was challenging for the onsen staff to explain these details in English.
 To address this issue, the students developed a system called “Ocket” that provides video explanations with English audio and subtitles on how to pay for admission and use the onsen properly. The tablet running the application is decorated in an inviting manner and includes a motion sensor that detects people approaching, triggering the guidance.
 Additionally, the video features Mr. Pantawat Lapananrat, an international student from Thailand, making this project truly global.

【Hot Spring (Onsen) Facility Hime no Yu Team B: Okojo L’Arc】
Shuntaro Tanaka and Chihiro Fukumoto

 The next team presented the "Onsen Information Guide Mascot." Similar to the Onsen Team A, this group also developed a product to assist onsen staff. The Hime no Yu onsen staff frequently explain the facility’s features to customers. Through interviews, students discovered that onsen staff often struggle to communicate with foreign visitors and effectively convey the charm and appeal of the onsen.
 The “Onsen Information Guide Mascot” is modeled after the Stoat (okojo), a native of Hakusan, and holds pamphlets and other goods in a tub in Stoat’s hand. The mascot also has a built-in speaker and can play messages recorded in English and Japanese by students to introduce the onsen. The original goal was to create a robot that could move around the onsen facility, but due to the number of students in the team, the plan was changed to stationary robot. Maybe they can try building a robot when they become upperclassmen.

【Gym Team: Shuttlecock Collector】
Soma Ioroi, Hajime Tani and Seiya Fujiwara

Badminton Club Practice

 The next team introduced the "Badminton Shuttlecock Collection Robot" to assist with gym cleanup. Through interviews with teachers who frequently use the gym, the team found that maintaining cleanliness was a common concern. At the Hakusanroku campus, the badminton club practices in the gym after school. After practice, collecting scattered shuttlecocks and placing them back into their cases is a tedious task. To address this, the Gym Team attempted to build a robot that would automatically place shuttlecocks into their tubes when thrown in the robot. Although they were unable to achieve full automation, they gained valuable insights into the challenges of transporting objects automatically. In particular, they realized that the feather of a shuttlecock makes it difficult to handle with an automated system. Reviewing and analyzing what didn’t work is just as important as achieving success—it will certainly be useful for their future projects.

【Maker Studio Team: Black Dame Dame】
Kaisyu Ishiharada, Ayane Ito and Ikki Hashimoto

 The last team is the “Cleanup Time Notification Robot”. ICT has a mini factory called Maker Studio as a facility for making things. After school, it is always bustling with students who love to making things such as robots. However, when students are deeply focused on their work, they often do not start cleaning up even when the faculty managing the Maker Studio reminds them to do so. Additionally, they sometimes become so absorbed in their work that they forget about dinner and miss their meals. To address this, Marker Studio Team built a robot that moves around the Maker Studio when clean-up time approaches, displaying the current time and letting students know it’s time to clean up. The robot had large time display and a speaker to broadcast messages. Since several students on this team had participated in the NHK ROBOCON College of Technology contest , they were able to build a robot that was able to perform multiple functions such as moving by tires and displaying the time. I thought it was good that they were able to make use of what they had learned in their daily activities.

 All teams delivered their presentations in English, and naturally, the Q&A sessions with foreign faculty members are also conducted in English. Students who had attended Japanese middle schools sometimes struggled to find the right English words, but they confidently presented their self-made products using the English skills they had developed over their first year of study.

I look forward to seeing what new ideas students will come up with in future Engineering Design courses.

Michihiro Hayashi

Hello, this is Yuri Makada from the Hakusanroku Office. This time, I would like to talk about the 1st and 2nd year Health and Physical Education classes held outside in the snow. In Ishikawa Prefecture starting from Tuesday, January 7th, 2025, the weather was a very harsh and it snowed intermittently from the 7th to around the 11th, accumulating as much as 1 meter of snow around the Hakusanroku campus.

On Thursday, January 23rd, 2nd Year Students

 The weather had been mild winter since mid-January in Hokuriku region, and although this is the time of year when it usually snows heavily, it had been raining on and off during the day. When the 2nd year Health and Physical Education class started, the sky was cloudy, and the snowball fight began immediately.
 The students were divided into two teams and they started attacking the other team's position after the signal to begin. It was difficult to move forward because their feet sunk deeply into the snow with every step they took, some students used sleds to move forward paddling like surfers!
 Next, a snowball fight took place with one team of three faculty members (Health and Physical Education teacher Philip Cadzow sensei and Learning Mentors Apirak Sang-ngenchai sensei and Domyson Abuan sensei) versus 20 2nd year students. After the signal to begin, the faculty team charged toward the 2nd year students' positions. However, the 2nd year students threw snowballs at them all at once from various directions, hitting them before they had time to avoid them, and the three faculty members ran back to their positions, gasping for breath to recover and try again. After this happened multiple times and the faculty were exhausted, their strategy was changed. They loaded a sled with a large amount of snow and headed once again toward the 2nd year students territory. By throwing snowballs one after another, they managed to pepper the students with snowballs.
 Towards the end of the class, a heavy rain began to fall, forcing the snowball fight to be canceled. However, it was impressive to see the 2nd year students enjoying the fight until the very last moment.

On Tuesday, January 28th, 1st Year Students

The snow had begun to melt due to mild temperatures and rain, but the weather turned colder and it started to snow on the 28th.
 First, as a warm-up, a free snowball fight took place. Since there were no rules, snowballs flew from various directions with students, laughing and enjoying themselves whenever they hit each other. After that, the students were divided into two teams and played capture the cone where each team had to capture the other teams’ cone and bring it back to their side to win. . After the signal, both teams began throwing snowballs at each other. According to the rules, anyone hit by a snowball had to return to their own territory and restart. The students desperately dodged the snowballs while continuing to attack their opponent's territory. In the midst of all this, Philip sensei sneaked into the opposing team’s territory, managed to grab the cone, and attempted to bring it back. However, the opposing team saw what Philip sensei was doing and pelted him with snowballs, and unfortunately Philip sensei had start again. The match lasted over 30 minutes, with both teams trying their best. Although there was no winner, each team showed great teamwork and gave the impression that they were enjoying the snowball fight.

Yuri Makada

Happy New Year everyone! I am Krishia Atillo, one of the learning mentors here at Hakusanroku Campus. I am delighted to share our Christmas Gift Exchanges from last year.

 To celebrate the essence of Christmas, we had a Christmas Gift Exchange for faculty, staff, and students last Tuesday, December 24th. We first had a White Elephant Christmas Gift Exchange for the faculty and staff who wished to participate. Since this type of gift exchange didn’t have a specific receiver, each person had to buy one generic gift that could be given to either male or female, young or old. All participating faculty and staff had to choose a number that corresponded to the gift they got. Once everyone got their numbers, we started to open the presents. The presents that each faculty and staff received were all useful and wonderful gifts, especially this winter season!

 During the learning session on the 24th, we held a Christmas Party Gift Exchange for the students. To make the party more fun and exciting, the Learning Mentors decided to hide the Christmas presents so students would have to find them. Once the students were able to find their Christmas gifts, each of them had to go to the center to open their presents. All of them were excited to open their presents! They were all delighted to receive their Christmas gifts!

 After the Christmas gift exchange, the Learning Mentors also prepared snacks for students to enjoy. They were able to enjoy drinking hot cocoa in cold weather, and ate cookies, chocolates, popcorn, and many more! Overall, the students had fun and were able to enjoy the Christmas Party Gift Exchange.

Krishia Atillo

Hello this is Kuroda, one of the Japanese language teachers at ICT. I would like to introduce some of the 2nd year students’ stories created in Japanese Expression IIB.
 In this class, instead of starting to write a story straight away, they wrote the main character's background and personality on a character sheet in the first lesson, wrote how the main character's problems would be solved on a story map in the second lesson, and finally started to write the main text in the third lesson. The character sheets for the teaching materials were created with reference to Eishi Otsuka's Character Maker (ASCII Shinsho, 2008) and the story maps were created with reference to Shigeki Yamamoto's Story Map for Creating Japanese Language Lessons (Toyokan Shuppansha, 2014).

 Yoh Nieda's work “Smoked Friendship” tells the story of the protagonist Chris P. Bacon, who loves bacon so much that he plots to ‘baconise all mankind’, but his friends, the roast pig man and Sal S. Chorizo stop him and return him to normal.
 I liked the ending, in which the protagonist's perverse wish is prevented by his friends, their friendship grows, and the culminating scene flows well. The work was also highly praised by other students.

 In Ruuna Nakazawa's work “Star Voyagers”, the main character is an alien who has lost his home planet. At the character sheet stage, the story seemed too grandiose, so she decided to cut out the scene where he lands on Earth first. Then, during writing the story map stage, she came up with the idea of transforming the protagonist into a police dog. This sci-fi-like story style setting makes me want to read the rest of the story.

 The protagonist of Kaya Yasuda's work “One Man and One Cat” is about an old man who lives by a lake. Since the death of his wife, he spends his days feeling as if he is neither alive nor dead, but an encounter with a cat brings about a small change. It is a quiet, heart-warming work, like a ray of light shining through an open window. Kaya says it was difficult to choose words that matched the atmosphere of the story. It is proof that he paid attention to every detail.

There were many other unique pieces of work. One student included his own rap lyrics. Another student included an image of an example of an Instagram anniversary story. Some students projected their personal problems onto the main character.
Although the class time was short, everyone seemed to concentrate on their creation.
 One student commented: ‘It was difficult to make the dialogue natural, professional writers are amazing’.
 There is no correct method for creating a story. However, in this assignment, I hope they were able to experience a process similar to engineering, such as designing the overall structure in advance and adjusting the detailed expressions. I hope that students enjoyed making the stories as much as they enjoy making things.

Kuroda