“Ohara House Katalyzer,” a nationally designated Important Cultural Property in the Bikan Historical Area.
As “a place to talk about the present and the future,” it also puts a strong emphasis on educational programs.
One of the programs hosted by Ohara House Katalyzer is Kurashiki Mirai K-juku.
The 10th session was held as a collaborative event with the Takahashi River Basin School.
The theme was “‘Serve the community through knowledge’: Mutual benefits between educational institutions and local communities.”
It was an event that deepened participants’ understanding of “What is education?” through topics such as education that can only happen in a local community and advanced school education learned from “America’s most desirable place to live.”
Here is a report on the seminar “10th Kurashiki Mirai K-juku: ‘Serve the community through knowledge’: Mutual benefits between educational institutions and local communities,” held on Saturday, February 22, 2020.
The information presented was current when this article was published in February 2020. Please note that it may differ from current information.
What is Kurashiki Mirai K-juku?
Kurashiki Mirai K-juku is a monthly seminar held at Ohara House Katalyzer, with the aim of comprehensively reforming education in schools and society and supporting teachers with a sense of purpose.
It began in December 2018 as “Kurashiki Mirai Teacher-juku” and was renamed “Kurashiki Mirai K-juku” in December 2019.
Since December 2019, the sessions have covered themes such as:
- Community ✕ Education ✕ Ways of Working
- Culture ✕ Manufacturing
- Community ✕ SDGs ✕ Education Reform
- Changing Ways of Working ✕ Community
▼Read our January 2020 report here.
Overview of the 10th Kurashiki Mirai K-juku: “Serve the community through knowledge”: Mutual benefits between educational institutions and local communities
The theme of the 10th Kurashiki Mirai K-juku was “‘Serve the community through knowledge’: Mutual benefits between educational institutions and local communities.”
| Date and time | Saturday, February 22, 2020, 1:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m. |
|---|---|
| Venue | Ohara House Katalyzer |
The seminar proceeded as follows:
| Format | Topic | Speaker |
|---|---|---|
| Talk | What will life in local communities be like in 2030? — Learning and livelihoods | Juichi Shibusawa |
| Lecture | Participatory education in “America’s most desirable place to live” | Yuki Yoshikawa |
| Summary | Wrap-up | Kensaku Okubo, Yoko Yamashita, and Hiroshi Sakanoue |
What will life in local communities be like in 2030? — Learning and livelihoods — Juichi Shibusawa
Juichi Shibusawa completed his doctoral studies at the Graduate School of Tokyo University of Agriculture and works as a Doctor of Agriculture.
His work to date includes serving as a director of the theme park Nagasaki Holland Village and the circular city Huis Ten Bosch, as well as serving as chair of the NPO Kyosei no Mori Network, where he has worked on community and human development in Japan and other countries.
He is also the great-grandson of Eiichi Shibusawa, who will appear on the 10,000-yen banknote from the first half of fiscal 2024.
In his talk, Mr. Shibusawa spoke about “social education,” using a small village in Akita Prefecture—the place that inspired his current work—as an example to explain what it means to learn in a local community.
We hope you’ll read on as if you were reading a story.
“Social education” learned from a small village in Akita Prefecture
There were said to be three large tree stumps near a shrine deep in the village, where the village’s guardian deity was enshrined.
Judging by the tree rings, the trees had grown for more than 280 years.
When he asked the villagers when they had been cut down, they said it was in April 1946.
The trees had been cut down in 1946, the year after the war ended.
At the time, Japan was a chaotic place, with the country reduced to scorched earth by the war.
It was a time when people across Japan had lost hope for the future, it seems.
Even in this small village in Akita Prefecture, people decided to sell the three natural cedar trees at the far end of the village to somehow bring back a sense of hope, and use the money to “generate electricity with hydropower.”
However, the trees were natural Akita cedars that had been protected by more than eight generations of ancestors.
“Is it right for us to cut them down?”
“Shouldn’t we leave them for our children, so they can have food to eat?”
The villagers debated the matter at length.
When the villagers could not make up their minds, the village head said, “If we’re going to do it, we might as well cut them down and regret it,” and they finally felled the Akita cedars their ancestors had carefully nurtured for generations.
They sold the Akita cedars in town and used the money to bring hydropower to the village, lighting the villagers’ homes.
When an incandescent light bulb was lit in each home, the villagers felt “warmth” before they felt “brightness,” and everyone in the village regained hope for life.
After that, they resolved to “keep on living,” and the cedar trees came to be called “treasures.”
A villager told this story and said, “If you’re going to live in the mountains, you need to be able to do both work and earn a living.”
Passing on ways of life through “local work”
What’s the difference between “work” and “earning a living”?
When he asked the villagers, they said, “For you people, work and earning money are the same thing,” and explained it this way:
- Earning a living is for your family
- Work is for the future
You have to mow the grass and transplant trees for your children’s generation and those who come after them.
This work earns no money at all, but without it the village cannot continue.
If people do not also do things that earn no money, the village will disappear.
That is why the villagers say, “Anyone who can only earn a living is only half a person.”
What does “work” mean?
The villagers answered, “Festivals.”
Festivals may seem like “play,” but the villagers say that festivals are “work,” and community gatherings are “work,” too.
Preparations for next year’s festival begin the day after this year’s festival ends.
At festivals, wisdom is passed down from the elderly to the young, and through preparing for the festival, people pass on “how to live” across generations.
Social education is “education for living”
Social education is “education for living,” learning through hands-on participation in activities such as festivals.
School education is “education for acquiring knowledge,” learning by engaging the mind through study, but that alone is not enough to live.
That is why we need “social education” to teach people how to live in their communities.
These days, people try to teach everything at school, but school education and social education are different things.
If children are not taught in their communities, they may gain knowledge but still not understand what it means to live.
Children then study for entrance exams and feel that their future is lost if they cannot do well, leaving them to live under constant pressure.
Mr. Shibusawa said the villagers taught him, “Society can’t go on under those circumstances.”
Another important part of social education is the festival-related community gathering.
The seemingly inefficient “community gathering” is social education
Mr. Shibusawa continued with a story about attending a community gathering in a village near Nagoya when he was a student.
At these “community gatherings,” people met night after night to discuss the festival, but they were not formal affairs like “meetings.”
“By the way, how are things with the rice in your fields?”
“My old woman’s back has been bothering her lately.”
“Isn’t your daughter getting to be about the right age?”
It was just like a neighborhood chat, and at first glance, the festival planning seemed to be getting nowhere.
There was no moderator, no one tried to sum things up, and there was no blackboard; they just kept talking about completely unrelated things.
As a student attending these gatherings, Mr. Shibusawa thought, “This is why Japan’s farming villages are so backward!”
He was furious at how irrational, unscientific, and inefficient it all seemed.
At the time, during the period of rapid economic growth, rationality, economic efficiency, and uniformity were valued, so he was astonished by how inefficient these “community gatherings” were.
However, Mr. Shibusawa says that this seemingly pointless chatter is necessary.
The gatherings help people understand:
- What is going on in each other’s households
- How the farmland is doing
- Whether people are financially comfortable or struggling
- What people think of one another
In this way, everyone gets a general sense of each household’s circumstances.
Mr. Shibusawa says this is something that cannot be discussed in a meeting; it is “a feeling that exists before it can be put into words.”
Time spent at these “community gatherings” is essential, allowing everyone to share what is happening with their fellow community members and understand their differences.
By the standards of today’s education, which considers the most efficient route to a conclusion the best, this would be “the worst kind of education.”
However, in times of great uncertainty, when people’s lives were heavily affected by seasonal changes in nature, they could not simply join forces toward a single goal, so they needed to share their individual circumstances with one another.
In the past, people in Japan held festivals to share not “knowledge” but “feelings,” learning knowledge through school education and feelings through social education.
Why local social education was lost
Why was local social education lost?
Mr. Shibusawa says, “Japan changed because of the war.”
Japan was reduced to scorched earth by the war and had to recover economically.
As a result, Japan has constantly focused on how to increase its GDP (gross domestic product).
Rationality, economic efficiency, and uniformity were emphasized during the period of rapid economic growth in order to increase GDP.
In other words, in postwar Japan, “things that make money” came to be regarded as valuable.
Full-time homemaking, childcare, and housework were not considered labor.
From “doing” to “being”
During the period of rapid economic growth, what people had done was given importance.
In English, people were evaluated based on their “doing (what they had done).”
- Which company they were president of
- What kind of work they had accomplished
Until now, “doing (what you have done)” has been emphasized, but from now on, “being (how you want to be)” will be important, says Mr. Shibusawa.
People born after the period of rapid economic growth do not consider making money or becoming wealthy to be values in themselves.
For example, when young people in Maniwa City, Okayama Prefecture, were asked what they wanted their future to be like, they answered:
- Live positively
- Spend time in nature
- Live with their grandparents
Now that the period of rapid economic growth is over, Japan has become prosperous, and people have come to seek “being (how you want to be)” rather than “doing (what you have done),” which pursues economic prosperity.
Mr. Shibusawa says that education in “being (how you want to be)” means sharing and empathizing with information that has not yet been put into words, as at “community gatherings,” rather than holding meetings—and that this is something local communities need to do.
From Mr. Shibusawa’s personal experiences, we learned that learning through involvement with the local community, not just through school education, is important in the times ahead.
Next, from the perspective of school education, Yuki Yoshikawa, a practical education planner at Okayama University, will speak about participatory education in “America’s most desirable place to live.”
Participatory education in “America’s most desirable place to live” — Yuki Yoshikawa
Yuki Yoshikawa is an experiential education planner at Okayama University, working to enhance local education under the theme of “Developing people through the whole community.”
She spoke about educational initiatives in Portland, known as “the most livable city in America,” and practical work at Okayama University through a lecture and mini-workshop.
How Portland Became “the Most Livable City in America”
The city of Portland in Oregon is now known as “the most livable city in America,” but it was originally a city suffering from worsening environmental pollution.
Industry flourished, and industrial oil flowed into the rivers, making them uninhabitable for fish. The wilderness was cleared, but tree stumps were left behind, and the city came to be called “Stumptown.”
However, people—especially young people—came together saying, “Let’s build our city!” The citizens worked together on urban development and built a city they wanted to live in with their own hands.
Portland, originally called “Stumptown,” rebranded itself.
Centered around Portland State University, which adopted the motto “Let Knowledge Serve the City,” it became a city where people learn in ways rooted in the community.
Community-Based Learning, Rooted in the Community: “CBL”
Learning rooted in the community is called CBL (Community-Based Learning).
CBL is education in which faculty, students, and community partners work together as one, supporting one another.
Partnership is essential for supporting one another.
Yoshikawa took out some yarn, and the workshop began with the instruction, “Use your hands to knit the yarn,” as a way to learn about partnership.
The participants were surprised by the sudden knitting activity!
Those who were used to knitting got started smoothly, while those who were not were unsure what to do.
The writer also struggled with knitting for the first time since elementary school…
Seeing people struggle, Yoshikawa said, “Use your hands and keep partnership in mind.”
Then, people who were good at knitting began helping those who were not.
With help from those who were good at knitting, one after another, even those who had struggled were able to do it.
Yoshikawa explained that partnership means supporting those around you by using your strengths.
In CBL, too, there are things that schools and students cannot solve on their own.
With support from community partners, schools can overcome areas where traditional school education falls short and make learning rooted in the community a reality.
To make this possible, specialists called APs (community coordinators) need to serve as liaisons among the three parties.
An AP (community coordinator) coordinates CBL and provides support tailored to the circumstances of the university and its partners.
Few schools in Japan have introduced this role so far, but in Okayama Prefecture, the number of schools adopting APs, particularly high schools, is gradually increasing.
At Portland State University, CBL is apparently implemented through an organizational structure comprising the university, community partners, and APs who coordinate their work.
How Learning in Portland Is Put into Practice at Okayama University
Okayama University offers “practical, community-engaged education,” addressing challenges identified by local communities and developing practitioners equipped with the practical knowledge needed to solve them, including judgment, leadership, teamwork, responsibility, and determination.
For example, students worked with local companies on forestry training, including using chainsaws to cut down trees.
International students also take part in the forestry training as an international internship. Along with learning from local people, they develop communication skills through activities such as translating what they have learned and teaching it to international students.
Another example is “job shadowing,” a workplace observation program in which students follow people at work and observe their jobs.
Rather than being like a factory tour, it lets students experience the usual flow of work.
The words people associate with “work” change significantly before and after job shadowing.
Before the experience, people apparently associate “work” with many negative words, such as “hard, busy, overtime, and quotas.”
After job shadowing, however, these change to positive words such as “pride, learning, fulfillment, growth, initiative, and collaboration.”
It seems that school education alone makes it difficult to picture what actual work is like, so students had been judging it based only on images from TV dramas and movies.
From Yoshikawa’s lecture, which offered an educational institution’s perspective, we learned that studying in cooperation with the local community, as at Okayama University, makes it possible to gain learning that is useful after entering society.
From the Writer
At the 10th Kurashiki Mirai K-juku, we learned about the importance of collaboration between educational institutions and the local community.
Listening to the two speakers made us realize how important it is to learn not only “knowledge” but also “sensibilities,” and we felt the importance of close ties between schools and the local community.
I also work as a community coordinator at a high school, and I have seen the moment when students’ eyes light up as they talk with adults from the local community.
The joy of discovering new “sensibilities” cannot be learned within school alone.
However, I also think that we can feel this because we have the “knowledge” provided by school education.
I felt that what matters most for children’s future is for the local community and educational institutions to respect each other’s approaches to education, understand one another, and work together.
Kurashiki Mirai K-juku will continue to hold seminars on education.
Be sure to check the details on the Ohara House Katalyzer website.
Articles about Ohara House Katalyzer
Kurashiki Mirai K-juku Information
| Name | Kurashiki Mirai K-juku |
|---|---|
| Date | February 22, 2020 (Sat.) |
| Location | 1-2-1 Chuo, Kurashiki City, Okayama Prefecture |
| Admission (tax included) | General: ¥3,000 (tax included) KATALYZER members: ¥2,000 (tax included) |
| Website | Ohara House Katalyzer | OHARA HOUSE KATALYZER |
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