Permalink : http://hdl.handle.net/2115/56829

JaLCDOI : 10.14943/J.HighEdu.21.9

With the goal of educating a new generation of global leaders, Hokkaido University established a new program called “the Nitobe College,” which recruited the first batch of 129 students in May 2013. The College is being operated in cooperation with the Hokkaido University Alumni Association, which also nominated a number of alumni called ‘fellows,’ who are in charge of interacting with groups of students, and some of whom will become mentors helping students pursue their career goals. The first meeting of the fellows and the Nitobe College students on Hokkaido University campus in May 2013. To evaluate the effectiveness of this meeting, a web-based crosssectional survey was conducted among the student participants. This report summarized the results of the survey. The findings suggested that the meeting was successful for helping the students build mutual understanding among themselves and with the fellows; however, further periodical meetings are necessary to maintain what they have already built and subsequently develop more interactions and communications among them so that mentoring by the fellows will be effectively established. The use of communication technology can facilitate this process because it will help overcome the difficulties in setting up regular meetings that all of the students as well as the fellows can attend.