NEWS

On March 6, 2024, at the "University SDGs ACTION! AWARDS 2024" held in Tokyo, Shiｍpei Kikukawa and Yujin Yamaguchi (both 1st-year students of the College of Sustainability and Tourism) appeared as finalists and received the Kumamoto Prefecture Yamato Town Award.

This event, which was established in 2018 and organized by the Asahi Shimbun, aims to gather and award innovative projects and ideas based on the activities and daily research of the younger generation to solve social issues. Out of 177 entries, 12 finalists were selected to give presentations. Kukukawa and Yamaguchi presented a project titled "Maximizing the Potential of Foreign Exchange Students" and won the award.

Yujin Yamaguchi, Representative of Emunitas Co., Ltd., Award Recipient's Comment:
"I am deeply honored to receive this valuable award. It feels surreal to be standing on the presenter's side now, considering that I was once sitting in the audience as a 1st-year junior high school student, watching university students' presentations. After enrolling at APU in April 2023, I learned about the employment situation of foreign exchange students through friends I made there. In Japan, there are cases where excellent foreign exchange students are evaluated only based on their Japanese language proficiency, and their potential diverse abilities are overlooked, leading to missed opportunities for employment. Therefore, to bridge the gap between exchange students and companies by building a system that properly evaluates their abilities based on actual performance, I founded the company Emunitas. It is incredibly encouraging to have our efforts recognized at this event and receive the special award from Yamato Town, Kumamoto Prefecture. We will cherish this connection and deepen our collaboration with Yamato Town, Kumamoto Prefecture, to realize various bridges. We appreciate your continued support for Emunitas."

Click here to watch the final presentation video of the finalists. (Japanese language only)