Functional Differentiation and Appropriate Scale of Institutions in the National Higher Education System

2014 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 23330243
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Sociology of education
• Research Institution: University of Miyazaki
• Principal Investigator: FUJITSUKA TOMOKAZU 宮崎大学, 教育・学生支援センター, 准教授 (30248637)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): ASONUMA Akihiro 名古屋大学, 教育学研究科, 教授 (80261759) ; OGATA Naoyuki 東京大学, 教育学研究科, 教授 (20314776) ; NISHIMOTO Hiroki 琉球大学, 大学教育センター, 准教授 (20301393) ; MURASAWA Masataka 広島大学, 高等教育研究開発センター, 准教授 (00284224) ; YONEZAWA Akiyoshi 名古屋大学, 国際開発研究科, 准教授 (70251428)
• Co-Investigator(Renkei-kenkyūsha): AMANO Tomomi 琉球大学, 大学教育センター, 准教授 (90346940) ; HASHIMOTO Koichi 東京大学, 教育学研究科, 教授 (40260509) ; HASEGAWA Yusuke 大分大学, 教育福祉科学部, 准教授 (30469324)
• Project Period (FY): 2011-04-01 – 2015-03-31
• Keywords: 高等教育

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This project demonstrates nation-wide inconsistencies between the functional differentiations based on learning types at the undergraduate level and those promoted by the government on the basis of the scale of graduate education.
The results of a quantitative study reveal that only 10.1% of undergraduate engineering students in national universities are highly motivated, and that they are distributed equally between institutions, independent of institutional size and student selectivity.
A qualitative study about leading-edge teaching practices in Japan and the U. S. illustrates that both faculty and university administrators recognize that certain organizational characteristics, such as restricted enrollment, flexible structure without departmental divisions, collegial relationships, strong integration of organization culture, and collaborative linkages with industry, can be essential and advantageous to the effective fostering of self-motivated engineers in undergraduate programs.

Free Research Field

教育社会学