SAKURA SCIENCE High School Program Group 4
Visiting Ochanomizu University Senior High School
On Thursday, October 23, 58 high school students and leaders from six countries, including Argentina, Bangladesh, Laos, Malaysia, and Papua New Guinea in SSHP Group 4, visited the Ochanomizu University Senior High School (Bunkyo Ward, Tokyo). There, they were given a classroom experience, had a cultural exchange, and attended special lecture given by TAKEUCHI Shoji, a research professor at the Graduate School of Information Science and Technology, The University of Tokyo.

At the welcoming ceremony, the Koto music club, the chorus club, and the dance club offered performances to welcome the visitors. The dance club filled the room with their voices saying "Dokkoisho!" "Soran! Soran!" during the in the Soran Bushi traditional song. In response, the overseas high school students performed dances and sang demonstrating their respective cultures. The people at the venue were unified by clapping, cheering, and with lights from their smartphones, making it feel like it was like a live show.

After that, the overseas high school students were divided into nine classes, from first year to third year students, and were allowed to participate in English, chemistry, biology, information science, and physical education classes. This gave them a chance to experience high school life in Japan. Programs were also set up for the visitors to enjoy unique projects in each class, such as traditional forms of play including origami, kendama, and fukuwarai and the like, group games such as quizzes and shiritori in English. Others included a paper airplane-flight distance competition and the like. The students enjoyed their time filled with meaningful exchanges and smiles.



In the special lecture which everyone was looking forward to, TAKEUCHI Sensei spoke about leading edge research on "bio-hybrid systems" that fuse organisms (especially cells) and machines. The students were full of penetrating questions on them and filled up the entire time with discussions regarding functional life of cultured muscle cells, the possibility, current status and issues regarding the cultivation of brain cells and their fusion with AI technology, the ethical issues, the future goals of cultured meat that can withstand consumption and many others.


