NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION
TOKYO REGIONAL OFFICE
November 07, 2002
The National Science Foundation's Tokyo Regional Office periodically reports on developments in Japan that are related to the Foundation's mission. It also provides occasional reports on developments in other East Asian countries.
Tokyo Office Report Memoranda are intended to provide information for the use of NSF program officers and policy makers; they are not statements of NSF policy.
Report Memorandum #02-08
Selected Projects under the
COE Program in the 21st Century
The following report was prepared by Kazuko Shinohara of the National Science Foundation's Tokyo Regional Office. Ms. Shinohara may be reached at kshinoha@nsf.gov
113 projects have been selected under the "COE Program in the 21st Century" (visit for details: http://www.nsftokyo.org/rm02-05.html) that was launched in JFY2002 by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT). The Program, originally named as "Top 30 Universities," has been controversial as some had inferred that the government would rank-order the universities. Instead, the program simply selects leading units in defined fields. All the Japanese universities are eligible to apply to this program. MEXT received 464 applications from 163 universities in a total of five fields. The Expert committee (chaired by Leo Esaki) members reviewed the applications. The five fields and the number of adopted projects are as follows:
Life Science: 28 projects
Chemistry/Materials Science: 21 projects
Information/Electric/Electronics: 20 projects
Human Literature: 20 projects
Interdisciplinary/New fields: 24 projects
The total budget allocated for this program for JFY2002 was Yen 18.2 billion (ca. $151.66 million). The selected projects will receive awards amounting somewhere between Yen 100 million and Yen 500 million (ca. $833,000-$4 million) per year for five consecutive years. All projects are subject to interim review after two years for continuation of support.
The universities that have projects selected are as follows (black: national universities; blue: private universities; green: public universities):
| 11 projects: | University of Tokyo, Kyoto University |
| 7 projects: | Osaka University, Nagoya University |
| 5 projects: | Tohoku University, Waseda University, Keio University |
| 4 projects: | Hokkaido University, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Kyushu University |
| 3 projects: | Tsukuba University, Ritsumeikan University |
| 2 projects: | Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, Yokohama National University, Toyohashi University of Technology, Nara Institute of science and Technology, Hiroshima University |
| 1 project: | Obihiro University of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine, Akita University, Ochanomizu University, Gunma University, Kanazawa University, Nagaoka University of Technology, Shinshu University, Nagoya Institute of Technology, Gifu University, Kobe University, Tottori University, Ehime University, Saga University, Nagasaki University, Kumamoto University, Miyazaki Medical College, University of Shizuoka, Himeji Institute of Technology, Osaka City University, Osaka Prefecture University, Kitasato University, Nihon University, Aoyama Gakuin University, Chuo University, Kokugakuin University, Hosei University, Sophia University, Tamagawa University, Tokai University, Meijo University, Kinki University, Aichi University |
Analyses have been made of the selection results. Whereas the selection resulted in a map very similar to the one for allocation of Grants-in-Aid, it is possible that they might not be selected in the future because of a more competitive environment. In other words, those universities that already have good reputation and currently have high research standards have been selected in this round of selection in this round of selection, but they might not be selected next time in what is hoped to be a more competitive environment.
On the other hand, a voiced concern is that the Program has just added funds to the already-funded projects. Also, there were questions as to how the possibilities in the future and capabilities of fostering personnel were evaluated. These concerns arise from the fact that the selection this time was closed. The selection standard and procedure were not disclosed. The original intent to promote university reform was clear. But, "what is COE" was not made clear. Only the selection results were revealed without explanation. What is called for, what the selection standard is, and how the selection was made, will need to be made public in the future.
In JFY2003, the Program will select COEs in the five fields of Medicine, Mathematics/Physics/Earth Science, Mchinery/Civil Engineering/Construction and other Engineering, Social Science, and Interdisciplinary area.
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