Introduction

United Graduate School Entrance Ceremony for 2018

Congratulations on your admission to the United Graduate School of Veterinary Sciences and the United Graduate School of Agricultural Science.

We are extremely pleased to have 11 and 21 graduate students respectively today, and on behalf of the faculty of the Gifu University United Graduate Schools I welcome all of you. I would also like to take this opportunity to give our congratulations to all the people who have supported you in your academic careers up to this point.

Each United Graduate School has over two decades of history, and both have traditionally had high ratios of international students and mid-career professionals among their students. In this new academic year, international students account for 28% and mid-career professionals for 41% among the newly-enrolled. Many of these have been asked or encouraged to attend graduate school by foreign governmental agencies and educational institutions, or by private-sector companies and local governments in Japan. Yet regardless of your motivations and backgrounds, this course also includes students proceeding directly from undergraduate programs to master's or doctoral programs. It is my hope that all of you complete your graduate courses here as highly-skilled professionals capable of making contributions to your professional duties wherever you are employed, as well as making "glocal" contributions. Therefore, the contents that you must study and the goals you must attain in your dissertation are set at a more advanced level.

However, I would like to emphasize that what you gain by your graduate school studies will probably not materialize into actual results immediately after you earn your degree. There are many cases where it takes around 20 years before advanced degree holders are able to contribute to the local community or make "glocal" contributions. Hence, you should also give plenty of thought to the skills you should acquire during your graduate studies that you will need to survive as a skilled professional during that "incubation" period. As members of the faculty at the United Graduate Schools, we are always ready and willing to offer you guidance and advice for such purpose.

In addition to making "glocal" contributions to society while serving private enterprises or governmental agencies, continuing your studies at the University is another very attractive option. In fact, we hope that a growing number of people aim to become researchers. Most research that goes on to win the Nobel Prize is in fact completed when the researcher was around 30 years old, which means that in many cases it was done when the laureate was in graduate school, and the ideas that he or she developed in that period then led to breakthroughs in various areas of natural science, social science, and humanity. Regardless of the field, the key to developing such ideas is the continuation of study and research.

A message from Professor Toshihide Masukawa, the theoretical physicist who was awarded the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physics, has been posted at Gifu University website. This message was specially given for the university students when I had the honor to talk with him last year. He said "Young people should have aspirations, dreams and hopes. Your constant, strenuous efforts to attain them will be a driving force for growth." I wanted to share his inspirational message with you all again today so that it will inspire you to become responsible members of society and devote yourselves to the growth and prosperity of Japan and the world in the near future.

In conclusion, I wish you to take a proper look at your future career as a skilled professional, or if you wish to be a researcher, to hold onto a dream. In doing so, please enjoy what the United Graduate Schools at Gifu University offer and make good use of them. Again, I congratulate all of you.

April 13, 2018
Hisataka Moriwaki
President of Gifu University

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