Nagoya University

About Nagoya University

Nagoya University has a 144-year history, dating from when the Temporary　Medical School/Public Hospital -- the forerunner of today's Nagoya University -- was established in 1871. The University became the last Imperial University of Japan in 1939, and the educational reforms in 1949 led to the beginning of Nagoya University under the new education system. From that time to this day, the University has been pursuing steady development.

With its free and vibrant academic culture, which has been passed down since its foundation, Nagoya University has been stepping up efforts to achieve two fundamental objectives stated in the Nagoya University Academic Charter established in 2000: "Nagoya University, through creative research activity, shall pursue the truth and produce results of scholastic distinction on the international stage," and "Nagoya University, through an education that values initiative, shall cultivate courageous intellectuals endowed with powers of rational thought and creativity." Our ability in world-class research has been proved by the fact that 6 out of the 13 Japanese people being awarded with the Nobel Prize in the 21st century are our faculty members. Throughout its long history, Nagoya University has sent many people who have the potential to play a leading role in various fields of society out into the world, thus making a contribution to the development of Japan and the world.

With "contribution to society" as its major goal, Nagoya University's faculty members are exercising their ingenuity to foster "human resources matching social needs that change with the times" and "those able to play a leading role in a wide range of fields in society." We aim to cultivate talented people who can exercise strong leadership in a rapidly changing world with their great wisdom and reliable knowledge and skills.

While working to further strengthen research and educational abilities, Nagoya University is also making university-wide efforts in internationalization, gender equality, and social contribution. Regarding internationalization, Nagoya University has three perspectives:

The first perspective is a shift from a unilateral point of view focusing on the West to multiple points of view. In particular, the Asian region, in which Japan is located, has a huge potential to lead the world; and without cooperation and harmonious relationships with other Asian countries, Japan would have no future. Nagoya University has already expanded a number of projects to countries in Asia and other parts of the world and advanced in international collaboration year after year.

The second perspective is the revitalization of interactive human exchange. Nagoya University currently has approximately 2,200 overseas students, which accounts for 14 percent of an approximate 16,000 total students in the University. Meanwhile, the percentage of Japanese students who have studied abroad while enrolled at Nagoya University (regardless of the length of study) is also increasing every year. In this way, we are actively promoting interactive human exchange both "from the world to Nagoya University" and "from Nagoya University to the world," with the aim of cultivating talented people with a global perspective and developing a network for them.

The third perspective is the intensification of English-language education, which helps students internationalize themselves. While Nagoya University provides various kinds of English language programs for Japanese students, it also offers as many as 1,140 lecture courses in English. Further, the number of curricula that can be completed only in English is also on the rise. Nagoya University's campuses serve as a meeting ground for students and researchers in Japan and from around the world, where they can interact with one another on a daily basis.

History of Nagoya University

In 1871, after the Meiji Restoration, Nagoya Prefecture (formerly the Nagoya Domain), under the guidance of Keisuke Ito and other pioneers from the Nagoya Domain's Smallpox Vaccination Clinic, established the Temporary Medical School/Public Hospital, which is said to have been the forerunner of today's Nagoya University, to spread Western medicine and cultivate medical practitioners. After a few twists and turns, the hospital and school were renamed the Aichi Medical School in 1881. In 1903 it was renamed the Aichi Prefectural Medical College, and in 1920 it became the Aichi Medical College.

In 1908, the Eighth Higher School was established in Yobitsugi-cho in Aichi County (now the city of Nagoya). This school was the predecessor of the University's former Faculty of Liberal Arts. In 1920, Yobitsugi-cho also became home to Nagoya Commercial College, predecessor of the University's School of Economics.

The establishment of a "comprehensive" university in Aichi Prefecture, and in particular the city of Nagoya-- which had grown into one of the largest cities in Japan--was something that the local residents wanted, and they continued to press the government for a long time. In 1931, the management of the Aichi Medical College was transferred to the national government, making way for the establishment of the Nagoya Medical College. In 1939, the expectations of the public were finally met when Nagoya Imperial University became a reality. The huge cost of establishing the university was completely covered by donations from Aichi Prefecture.

Nagoya Imperial University was established with two schools, the School of Medicine and the School of Science and Engineering. In 1942, the School of Science and Engineering was divided into the School of Science and the School of Engineering. The following year, the Research Institute of Aeronautical Medicine was established. The escalation of the war led to air strikes on Nagoya that severely damaged the University by the time the war came to an end in August 1945.

Amidst post-war democratization, construction and recovery, the Research Institute of Aeronautical Medicine was abolished and the Research Institute of Environmental Medicine was founded in 1946. In October 1947, the name of the university was changed to Nagoya University (under the old education system), and then in 1948, the School of Letters and the School of Law and Economics were founded, thus making Nagoya University a comprehensive university.

Educational reforms in 1949 led to the launching of Nagoya University under the new education system. The new Nagoya University was made up of the School of Letters, School of Education, School of Law and Economics, School of Science, School of Medicine, School of Engineering, the Research Institute of Environmental Medicine and the Research Institute of Atmospherics (the current Solar-Terrestrial Environment Laboratory). At the same time, it also included other schools such as the Eighth Higher School, Nagoya Economic College (the old Nagoya Commercial College),  Okazaki Higher Normal School (founded in 1945; predecessor to the School of Education). Nagoya University continued to expand as a comprehensive university, strengthening its foundations by dividing of the School of Law and Economics into two separate schools in 1950, followed by the establishment of the School of Agricultural Sciences in 1951. The first graduate school was established under the new education system in 1953. With the founding of the graduate schools of Medicine and Agriculture in 1955, all of the undergraduate departments had now been paired with graduate schools.

Despite the tight finances and severe lack of materials after the war, faculty, staff, students and graduates combined their efforts to recover from the war and set about concentrating the disparate schools in Higashiyama. The charity of private organizations saw the long-sought-after auditorium and library built in Higashiyama, with the Toyoda Auditorium, a symbol of the university, being completed in 1960 followed by the Furukawa Library (now the Furukawa Hall) in 1964. Research organizations were also expanded with the establishment of the Institute of Plasma Physics (now known as the National Institute for Fusion Science) in 1961 and the Water Research Institute in 1973.

From 1990 onwards, the university started to establish independent graduate schools in rapid succession. The Graduate School of International Development was founded in 1991, followed by the Graduate School of Human Informatics in 1992, the Graduate School of Mathematics in 1995, and the Graduate School of Languages and Cultures in 1998. 2001 saw the establishment of the Graduate School of Environmental Studies, followed two years later by the opening of the Graduate School of Information Science in 2003. At the same time, because of the focus on the graduate schools, the existing undergraduate schools were reorganized into a graduate school-centric system. On the undergraduate education front, the Faculty of Liberal Arts was abolished in 1993, making way for the implementation of a unified four-year education program the following year. The structural reorganization that accompanied this change brought with it the establishment of the university's ninth undergraduate department, the School of Informatics and Sciences, in 1993.

In 2004, Nagoya University embarked on a new journey as a national university corporation. Not long after, the EcoTopia Science Institute was established in 2005, followed by the Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences in 2012.

As of 2012, Nagoya University boasts nine undergraduate schools, 14 graduate schools, three research institutes and two inter-university service facilities, standing strong and proud as one of the country's core "comprehensive" universities.

Accreditation

• Institutional Accreditation or Recognition - Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan
• Year of first Accreditation - 1952
• Other Specialized or Programmatic Accreditations - Japan University Accreditation Association (JUAA); National Institution for Academic Degrees and University Evaluation (NIAD-UE)

Rankings

General rankings

• The university has been ranked 15th in 2009 and 21st in 2010 in the ranking "Truly Strong Universities" by Toyo Keizai.
• In another ranking, Japanese prep school Kawaijuku ranked Nagoya as the 8th best university in Japan.
• The Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) 2009 ranks Nagoya University as fourth in Japan.
• The 2009 THE-QS World University Rankings (From 2010 two separate rankings will be produced by the Times Higher Education World University Rankings and the QS World University Rankings) ranks Nagoya University as fifth in Japan.
• The 2010 QS Asian University Rankings rated Nagoya number ten in Asia and number five in Japan, while the QS World University Rankings for 2011 ranked Nagoya 80th in the world.

Research performance

• Nagoya is one of the top research institutions in Japan. According to Thomson Reuters, Nagoya is the 5th best research university in Japan.
• Its research standard is especially high in Physics (6th in Japan, 61st in the world), Chemistry (7th in Japan, 43rd in the world), and Biology & Biochemistry (5th in Japan, 97th in the world).
• Weekly Diamond reported that Nagoya has the 6th highest research standard in Japan in research funding per researchers in COE Program.
• In the same article, it's also ranked 6th in terms of the quality of education by GP funds per student.
• In addition, Nikkei Shimbun　on 16 February 2004 surveyed the research standards in Engineering studies based on Thomson Reuters, Grants in Aid for Scientific Research and questionnaires to heads of 93 leading Japanese research centers, and Nagoya was placed 9th (research planning ability 5th//informative ability of research outcome 9th/ability of business-academia collaboration 6th) in this ranking.
• Furthermore, Nagoya had the 8th highest number of patents accepted (108) in 2009 among Japanese universities.
• It has a high research standard in Social Science & Humanities. Asahi Shimbun summarized the amount of academic papers in Japanese major legal journals by university, and Nagoya University was ranked 4th during 2005-2009.
• RePEc in January 2011 ranked Nagoya's Economic department as Japan's 13th best economic research university.

Graduate school rankings

• Nagoya Law School is considered one of the top law schools in Japan, as it was ranked 10th in the pass rate of the Japanese Bar Examination in 2010.

Alumni rankings

• According to the Weekly Economist's 2010 rankings, graduates from Nagoya have the 38th best employment rate in 400 major companies in Japan.

Services of Nagoya University

University Library

The University Libraries, consisting of the Central Library, Medical Library, and libraries in each school/graduate school, provide services as centers for academic information with the objective of supporting education and research activities.

In recent years, to keep up with globalization and the evolution of information, the University Libraries have started providing a variety of academic information in digital formats, including e-books, databases and electronic journals.

Nagoya University Museum

The Nagoya University Museum was founded in April 2000 and is the fifth largest comprehensive university museum in Japan. The objective of the museum is to store academic samples and documents from Nagoya University, as well as feedback from research results, in order to be a resource for the public and to give something back to the people of Japan and the world.

The primary missions of the museum are as follows:

• Research
• Next-generation education
• Exhibits
• Creation and inheritance of knowledge
• Collection of samples
• International exchange

Information Plaza

As a hub for linking the university to society and disseminating information about the university, the Nagoya University Information Plaza is a facility that provides comprehensive information on the latest Nagoya University scientific research results for the general public and potential candidates for admission,

Members of the Nagoya University Alumni Association may visit the 2nd floor of the facility where information about the university and Alumni Association are provided. They can also use the alumni lounge.

Chemistry Gallery

Located on the on the 2nd floor of the Noyori Material Science Laboratory, the Chemistry Gallery was built to commemorate the awarding of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry to Dr. Ryoji Noyori, a Nagoya University Distinguished Professor, in 2001. In order to convey the importance of chemistry to the general public and develop next-generation researchers, the gallery is open to the public. Distinguished Professor Noyori's Nobel Prize exhibition room includes displays entitled "Inspiring Next-Generation Researchers" and "Brief History of Dr. Noyori's Achievements".