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On Thursday, December 18, an event was held on Hiyoshi Campus for participants of the 2025 Keio University Student Conference to deliver their final proposals to the president of the University.

The Student Conference, which completed its fourth iteration, is a program where students discuss and make proposals for Keio University’s overall vision, specific objectives, and attainable targets in order to achieve the “Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).” Students are selected from across all of Keio’s undergraduate faculties through open recruitment and random selection.

This year continued the previous year’s theme of “Keio University Towards 2050 .” Students deepened their understanding of the state of affairs in Japan and the world as they pertain to the SDGs by participating in lectures by experts in the Spring Semester and a summer camp with other students from Keio’s affiliated schools. In the Fall Semester, the students worked in groups to discuss and finalize their proposals on specific actions required for Keio to realize its aims. This event was the culmination of all their work.

During the event, student delegates delivered their proposals to President Kohei Itoh and Vice-President Okuda in front of a group of university officials and related personnel. Among them were two supervisors of the Conference, Professor Norichika Kanie and Guest Professor Hiroko Kuniya, who are both from the Graduate School of Media and Governance, and other faculty and staff members.

Eight proposals were submitted by the students during the presentation.

• Achieving "no Keio students giving up on studying abroad"
• Creating a care package distribution system to support one another during illness
• Introducing measures to increase donation rates to the university from younger alumni
• Cultivating awareness of agriculture and food through hands-on farm experiences and mobile ordering system in conjunction with a food drive
• Building university-based community development for health and well-being through using simple voting systems
• Promoting a disaster-resilient society focused on disaster education and reducing digital waste
• Improving recycling rates through separating waste and reducing combustible waste
• Promoting fun and sustainable greening activities using leaf mold

During the Q&A, the presenters took questions from President Itoh, which led to exchanges that facilitated further exploration into their respective topics. The participants presented strong proposals that reflected what they learned over the past year, from highly practical, actionable proposals based on interviews with companies and faculty to overarching visions of what they should aim for in the future.

The proposals submitted at this session will be reviewed and discussed internally with President Itoh spearheading the deliberations. Adopted proposals will be integrated into the university’s official plan within the academic year. If a plan is approved, it will be implemented as a project starting in April 2026. We hope that the students’ proposals can bring about meaningful changes in people’s behavior and produce future leaders of society from Keio University who will go on to contribute to the SDGs and change the world.

Photo:Takeshi Kishi