News and Topics

From August 6 to August 9, six students who will be dispatched via the United Nations Youth
Volunteers program to United Nations organizations such as UNDP, UN Women, and UNFPA for approximately five months, starting in September 2024, participated in training sessions at the KGU Tokyo Marunouchi Campus, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the National Center for Global Health and Medicine.

Under an agreement with the United Nations Volunteers (UNV), Kwansei Gakuin University offers a five-month UN Youth Volunteers program in which students are sent to UN agencies in major developing countries in Asia and Africa to work with UN staff in public relations, research, and other activities. Since the program began in 2004, approximately 120 students have participated. As of August 2024, the program is being implemented with the participation of four universities in Japan (core school: Kwansei Gakuin University; partner schools: Meiji University, Meiji Gakuin University, and Rikkyo University).

KGU offers a pre-dispatch training program to help students acquire the knowledge and skills they will need at their destination. At the beginning of the training program, Mr. Shun-ichi Murata, Director of the Youth Volunteer Japan Training Center for the UNV Program, gave opening remarks and conducted an orientation. In the program held at the National Center for Global Health and Medical Research on August 7, the Director of the Human Resources Development Division of the Bureau for International Medical Cooperation gave a lecture on disease prevention and treatment, as the students considered the actual safety measures they would need to take at the country they were sent to. 

For the program held at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on August 9, three MOFA officials gave lectures introducting the United Nations' activities, discussing development challenges at the United Nations, and humanitarian assistance. The students also had the opportunity to interact with other MOFA officials of the same generation. The students listened to the lectures with serious expressions as they considered their future careers and activities in the countries to which they will be dispatched, and asked a constant stream of questions, demonstrating the positive attitude of the participating students.