Thoughts on the 150th Anniversary | Ikuo Kaneko (Dean, Graduate School of Media and Governance)

2008.11.27

It is well known that when Yukichi Fukuzawa founded Keio University, he was influenced by the public schools of Great Britain. The Meiji government began establishing public schools throughout Japan in the fifth year of the Meiji era (1872), but in Kyoto, "bangumi shogakko" (community-based elementary schools) had already been established three years earlier in all 64 school districts of the city. In his "Kyoto Gakkoki" (Record of Kyoto Schools), Fukuzawa states that he was freshly surprised to see these "public" bangumi shogakko, which were created through the efforts of Kyoto's citizens.

What particularly interested Fukuzawa was that the bangumi shogakko were established through funds contributed by local residents. "Kyoto Gakkoki" states, "The cost of the elementary schools, when they were first built, was half subsidized by the government, and half was provided by the wealthy merchants of the city." Keio University, rather than receiving funds from the "city," has developed its educational environment, including constructing buildings at various milestones, through donations from alumni and supporters.

I was a student at the Yochisha Elementary School during Keio University's 100th anniversary, and I suddenly remembered my mother saying resentfully, "We're being asked to donate for the Yochisha to build the centennial memorial hall, but our children won't be able to use the new building that will be completed years from now." Some thirty-odd years later, on the occasion of the Yochisha's 125th anniversary, I found myself in the position of asking parents for donations as the head of the Yochisha. At that time, as part of the commemorative project, a functional and wonderfully beautiful dining hall and classrooms designed by Mr. Yoshio Taniguchi were built, but the sixth-graders of that time could not use them. Some of those parents might have felt the same way my mother did. Instead, they would go on to junior high school and study in the educational environment left behind by their predecessors.

The tradition of a private school supported by its benefactors is, in essence, this system of reciprocity. What is built with one's own donations is not necessarily used by oneself or one's own children; it is for the children and students who come after. In return, those who study at Keio University today benefit from the intellectual and material assets accumulated over the Juku's 150-year history.

(Date Published: 2008/11/27)