This research aims to develop a new program for first year education with a view to cultivating students' abilities to work in groups, to conduct case studies, and to analyze and present their findings in a creative way. In this program, each group was assigned a case study of an NPO in Himeji area. Five or six students work in a group and conduct research on the target organization. They interviewed NPO workers and participate in social activities to deepen their understanding of the organization. In the end, each group shared the result of the study through powerpoint presentations and short films. Survey was conducted to analyze the responses of both students and local NPO workers to this educational experiment. The survey shows that this program contributed developing students' interests in social activities. NPO workers also evaluated this attempt positively as an approach to co-develop project-based learning that could offer merits both for students and NPOs.
Papers on Environmental Information Science, 25 191-196, 2011
Environment Planning needs deliberation and multiple citizen participation. We held the meeting on environmental vision of Numazu City by randomly selected citizens. The method of the meeting was to choose alternatives after discussion. We build the framework for the discussion and evaluated if balanced discussion was implemented with analyzing aural descriptions of participants from recording. The result was that discussion was balanced and diverse. The framework was effective and the facilitator played an important role. Participants were likely to say faults of alternatives but rarely opposite to each other. One day discussion was effective as learning process but insufficient as deep discussion for group decision making.
Papers on Environmental Information Science, 24 99-104, 2010
Recently, public meeting by randomly selected citizen are held in the word and in Japan. That kind of meetingis noticed as new method of understanding the citizen opinion. We held the meeting on the subject of municipal vision, and verify the diversity and deliberativeness of this method. Demographic attributes of the participants was not as same as that of whole city, but behavior of them was different from that of usual participants who were representatives or voluntary persons. Participants' choice changed after the meeting. Information and discussion seems to affect the participants to change their choice. But it also revealed that the participants didn't surely convince their choice. We can say that change of the choice was a result of deliberation. We also need further study for mechanism of change.
Papers on Environmental Information Science, 23 413-418, 2009
Public participation and "meningful replies" in it are essential to a successful SEA. In this context we looked into and appraised the public participation mandates of U.S. Forest Service which are regulated by the National Environment Policy Act. What we found are: the public participation mandates are instrumental to formulate democratic and transparent decision making process; the U.S. Forest Service has incrementally adapted itself to collaborative approach; perception and behavior of the foresters have become more pliant; and the meningful replies in the public participation are realized over time to achieve a successful SEA. The findings are suggestive to public participation in SEA for Japan.
Papers on Environmental Information Science, 23 471-476, 2009
The social concern with public participation in "Check" process in basic environmental plan has been growing. There are two types of external evaluation method. The one is to consult an evaluation committee consist of experts and another is to conduct a resident satisfaction survey which is often used in New Public Management. This paper discusses a new method of participatory evaluation that is to consult a taskforce composed of so called "Voluntary Investigator". In order to get knowledge of this new method, this paper conducted a case study of "Osaka Citizen Taskforce for Environmental Investigation".
Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Apr, 2014 - Mar, 2017