Field-based learning that takes students out of the classroom and into real-world settings is gaining traction in Japanese education, with students from Dalton Tokyo Junior and Senior High School and Minerva University in the United States visiting the Unosumai district of Kamaishi in Iwate Prefecture in November as part of an inquiry-based learning program to trace the aftermath of the March 11 disaster. (News On Japan)

Foreign nationals have been appointed as drivers on local bus routes for the first time nationwide, using Japan’s Specified Skilled Worker program, in a move aimed at easing chronic labor shortages in the sector. (News On Japan)

Kyoto University has been selected as a candidate for designation as an “University of International Research Excellence,” a national program that provides government funding to institutions aiming to conduct world-class research. (News On Japan)

As part of a postwar 80th-anniversary project titled “Passing On, Staying Connected,” this article looks back on the Battle of Okinawa through the memories of Higa Tomiko, who survived one of the fiercest ground battles of World War II by holding up a white flag, reflecting on what she saw as a seven-year-old girl who wandered alone through a devastated battlefield and the feelings she now hopes to entrust to future generations. (News On Japan)

The grand prize has been announced in the annual Creative Four-Character Idiom Awards, which capture the social mood of the year through newly coined expressions, with the winning works unveiled this year through a dynamic calligraphy performance by high school students. (News On Japan)