On the afternoon of Monday, August 31, the "Keio University SDGs Conference—Keio University Student Conference (KUSC) 2026 Field Trip" was held at the Japan Airlines (JAL) Sky Museum at Haneda Airport. Building on the success of summer camps held on campus over the past four years, this was the first time in the conference's five-year history that it was held off-campus. On the day, approximately 40 Keio students, ranging from elementary school to university level, gathered at the JAL Sky Museum to deepen their understanding of sustainability initiatives in the aviation industry. Students from the affiliated schools and the university exchanged opinions with JAL employees.
The "Keio University Student Conference (KUSC)" is an initiative where selected university students from all faculties deepen their knowledge through lectures by experts and discuss visions, goals, and targets during the spring semester. In the fall semester, they consider actions to be implemented as Keio University's SDGs. Ultimately, the recommendations compiled through these discussions are handed to the President. Through this field trip and the specific initiatives of a single corporation, participants were able to gain a broad perspective that extends beyond SDGs within Keio.
On the day, participants first toured the museum individually before splitting into seven groups to tour the hangar while receiving explanations from JAL employees. Afterward, Vice-President Akiyō Okuda expressed gratitude to JAL and shared her expectations for the project. This was followed by a lecture from Shinnosuke Fukuda of JAL's Sustainability Promotion Department on challenges in the aviation industry and the promotion of Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF), which is made from sustainable raw materials such as waste cooking oil and biomass. The group discussion themes following the lecture were "The Value of Airplanes (Let's imagine a world without them)" for the first half, and "Ways to Promote SAF (Let's consider the current status of price and volume)" for the second half. Various JAL employees, including sustainability promotion staff, maintenance crew, and cabin attendants, joined the discussions with one employee per group.
In the final group presentations of the program, proposals were made such as "Ways to Promote SAF," "Holding exhibitions and stamp rallies at the Mita Festival," and "Building a system led by local governments to collect and reuse household waste oil." In the final review, Kazuya Kameyama, General Manager of JAL's Sustainability Promotion Department, indicated that the proposals from participants might be utilized in JAL's future initiatives. For the Keio students, it was a day to interact directly with adults working to promote SDGs in a corporate setting and to feel their enthusiasm firsthand.