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U Illinois CABER Assoc Director Vijay Singh Visits GSA, Strengthening Partnership for Collaboration and Student Exchange

Dr. Vijay Singh, a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign‘s College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences (ACES), visited the Graduate School of Agriculture (GSA) on August 4 to review joint efforts made under their partnership to date, and discuss the renewal of the agreement, valid until May 2015.

Dr. Singh, who also serves as Associate Director for Engineering at the university’s Center for Advanced BioEnergy Research (CABER), engaged in a series of meetings throughout the day. The first one was with GSA Dean Hisashi Miyagawa, Vice Dean Eiji Nawata, International Committee Chair Naoshi Kondo and Professor Reiko Urade, held at the Dean’s office.

“GSA has made a range of efforts to remain globally competitive,” said Vice Dean Nawata during the meeting. “Examples include the launches of an English-taught master’s/PhD course in agriculture and an exchange program that can count toward double master’s degrees in collaboration with the ASEAN University Network, both funded by the Japanese education and science ministry (MEXT)‘s initiatives for academic internationalization.”

“But to sustain the international appeal increased by these efforts, we need to address certain issues, such as securing long-term funding, assuring the English-taught course quality, and retaining qualified international affairs staff.”

Drs. Singh and Miyagawa agreed to further enhance the collaboration based on the agreement, and expressed their intent to continue the partnership.

Dr. Singh then visited the Michihisa Iida laboratory of field robotics and precision agriculture and the Tatsuhiko Shiraiwa laboratory of crop science, both at GSA, and had scientific discussions.

In a bid to proceed with renewing the agreement, Dr. Singh also had a meeting with GSA international affairs staff to deliberate on the terms and conditions. “Yuichiro (Tsuchi, a master’s student sent from the Urade lab) is doing an excellent job at my lab, and getting along with the lab members as well. Some of them are now showing stronger interest in staying at GSA on the exchange program,” said Dr. Singh, expressing his appreciation for the mutual benefit of the agreement.

Dr. Singh was also invited to talk on bioprocessing technologies for industrial products and fuels at an open seminar held at a GSA lecture room. The seminar, organized by the Kondo lab and chaired by Professor Shiraiwa, attracted a near-capacity audience. Dr. Singh’s presentation was so engaging that the subsequent Q&A session lasted half an hour longer than planned and no one left the room until the very end.

Vijay Singh, Hisashi Miyagawa, Reiko Urade, Eiji Nawata
From left: Profs. Vijay Singh, Hisashi Miyagawa, Reiko Urade, and Eiji Nawata

Vijay Singh, Hisashi Miyagawa, Reiko Urade, Eiji Nawata, Yutaka Iijima
Profs. Miyagawa and Nawata presenting Kyoto University and GSA’s efforts to remain internationally competitive.