A PROJECT ON DEVELOPING UNDERGRADUATES' CAREER CONSCIOUSNESS THROUGH AN EXTRACURRICULAR EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM

Enhancing students' career consciousness is one of the biggest issues that many Japanese universities are facing. Along with academic curriculum, they try to provide their students with various opportunities, such as internship programs, that enable them to consider the importance of career development. Tokai Gakuen University, which has five faculties and about 4,000 students, has started the Career Development Program (CDP) this academic year as an extracurricular educational program. The CDP consists of four-semester courses, and each course has 15 classes in one semester. Students are given lectures by entrepreneurs and professionals from various fields, and also take part in small group activities that involve them in a lot of discussions and presentations. One of the activities conducted this academic year was a Quality Control (QC) Circle activities [1], in which students from different faculties got together forming several small research groups. They investigated if there were any problems on campus, did research on how to make improvements, and finally held a presentation contest to choose the group that made the best effort to make their campus a better place to learn. This study reported some of the students' works, and what they learnt from the QC Circle activities. Some educational implication on their career development through this experience was discussed.