An award ceremony was held on April 19, 2017, for five Sylff fellows of the Institute of Political Education “Pedro Arrupe” for the 2017–18 academic year: Giuseppe Rizzuto, Chiara Digrandi, Giulia Crisci, Bruno Buffa, and Francesca Lotta.

(From left to right) Giuseppe Rizzuto, Chiara Digrandi, Giulia Crisci, Bruno Buffa, and Francesca Lotta.

The five are receiving their fellowships under the new financial scheme, which was introduced in 2016–17. In switching to the new scheme, the institute established what it calls the Idea-Action Research Program whose theme is “Urban Leadership: Understanding Futures, Governing Cities Starting from the Margins.”

The program is designed to encourage research in the social sciences and humanities that addresses issues from a strictly scientific point of view but, at the same time, provides mechanisms and operational instruments to promote practical implementation (hence the name, "Idea-Action"). The program supports the development of a new generation of researchers who are interested in transforming society for the better.

The new Sylff fellows are a diverse group of scholars addressing issues from their own area of expertise, such as Asian and African language and culture; psychological intervention in development and socio-educational institutions; methodologies of art history; regional, urban, and environmental planning; and urban and regional planning.

A Sylff orientation and presentation meeting was held, during which Massimo Massaro, president of the Sylff steering committee at the Arrupe Institute, informed the five fellows of the mission of the Sylff program and the availability of support programs, including SRA and SLI. Addtitional programs are currently being developed.

Agnieszka Batko, middle, with members of the Tokyo Foundation.

Agnieszka Batko, a current Sylff fellow at Jagiellonian University in Poland, is now conducting research on the Japan-Korea relationship at Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo. She is in the second year of PhD program in political science at the Jagiellonian and is focusing on the role of NGOs in promoting reconciliation between the East Asian neighbors.

She became interested in her current research topic when she participated in a group study tour to East Asia in 2015 on the theme of post-war reconciliation, organized by the Exchange Program for Regional Integration in East Asia and Europe (EPRIE) and funded by the Robert Bosch Foundation.

Jagiellonian University sees leadership potential as a vital criterion in the selection of Sylff fellows and encourages students to go abroad to broaden their perspectives. Batko has amply demonstrated this potential by leading and organizing various student activities, including a photography workshop for high school students aimed at promoting awareness of contemporary social issues.

The Sylff Association is happy to support Batko’s initiatives and wishes her great success in her research of international relations.

Sylff fellows and steering committee members are always welcome to stop by the Foundations’ office while visiting Tokyo.

From down left and clockwise:
Ioannis Kourtis (Sylff fellow), Dimitrios Athanasiou (Sylff fellow) , Professor Stavros Thomadakis (SSC member), Venetia Sakellariou (Sylff fellow), Iason-Spyridon Xygkis (Sylff fellow), Georgia Despoti (Sylff fellow), Ergina Bonori (Sylff fellow), Loukas Spanos (SSC member and Sylff alumnus), Dimitrios Karagkounis (Sylff fellow), Andreas Vasileiou (Sylff fellow), Maria Vardaki (Sylff program executive), Professor Costas Dimitracopoulos (SSC member).

Loukas Spanos, graduated Sylff fellow and SSC member, presents Sylff program to the new fellows.

Eight outstanding students at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens were awarded Sylff fellowships under the New financial scheme in March 2017. This is the 2nd year of fellowship under the scheme after it was successfully introduced to Athens in 2016. (see details of the program ).

The eight latest fellows not only have excellent academic credentials but have also demonstrated strong leadership in their research and social activities, both locally and internationally. We wish them a great success in their graduate studies and their careers.

Sylff Association brochure

The Sylff Association was launched in April 2017 to commemorate Sylff’s 30th anniversary. It brings closer together the many stakeholders in our community: current and graduated fellows, steering committee members at the 69 Sylff institutions, and the staff of the Nippon Foundation and the Tokyo Foundation.* It will “pool the wisdom that has been accumulated over the years and deepen and strengthen the ties among us,” notes Association Chairman Yohei Sasakawa in his message introducing the new initiative.

The Association will be offering various support programs on a continuing basis to promote fellows’ academic advancement and development as leaders, as well as to encourage networking.

Fellows are encouraged to share their insights, knowledge, and experience with other Association members to hone their leadership qualities and to promote peaceful, sustainable, and socially inclusive development.

For more information, download the Sylff Association brochure.

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* Sylff is a joint Tokyo Foundation–Nippon Foundation program. The Association is an initiative by the Tokyo Foundation (which serves as the secretariat) to create a more personalized program.

If you are a Sylff fellowship recipient but have not been receiving email communications from the Tokyo Foundation, please contact us at sylff[a]tkfd.or.jp (replace [a]with @) to get connected. Please also let us know if there are changes in your email or postal address or other contact information.

Call for Applications for FY2017

The Sylff Association is pleased to announce Sylff Research Abroad (SRA)’s call for applications for fiscal 2017 (April 1, 2017, to March 31, 2018).

SRA supports dissertation-related academic research in a foreign country for current or past Sylff fellowship recipients enrolled in a doctoral program. Grants of up to US$5,000 are provided to successful applicants.

The deadline is June 27 for the first selection round (research to be conducted after July 27) and January 9, 2018, for the second round (research to be conducted after February 5). Click here for details of the announcement.

We look forward to receiving your applications!

2016-2 Awardees

The Sylff Association is pleased to announce the 11 recipients of SRA awards in the second selection round for fiscal 2016. We received a large number of applications from fellows around the world, including many who are pursuing a doctoral degree at non-Sylff institutions. It was a highly competitive selection.
The applications showed that fellows are actively engaged in various fields of academic learning on a global scale, and it is our pleasure to support their research abroad. Congratulations to all the winning applicants! We send them our best wishes and hope that their study abroad will further enrich their dissertation.
The names of the awardees and their home and the host institutions can be viewed here.

Marta González Cavia, second form left, and Professor Fernando Bayón with the Tokyo Foundation members

Marta González Cavia, a 2016 Sylff fellowship recipient under the new financial scheme at Deusto University, Bilbao, Spain, visited the Tokyo Foundation with her PhD supervisor, Professor Fernando Bayón, on April 18, 2017. She is currently conducting research on the reinvention and regeneration of industrially obsolescent waterfront areas of Bilbao in an attempt to add new values as an urban public space. González is an architect who has long been actively involved in urban regeneration.

Bilbao in northeast of Spain developed as a center of the country’s steel industry beginning in the early twentieth century. Following the decline of the industry, the city has been transforming itself to a city of art and culture, as symbolized by the opening of Guggenheim Museum Bilbao in 1997. In this context, the transformation of waterfront areas is providing a unique opportunity for the city’s future development.

The regeneration of such areas is often dominated by economic interests, leading, at times, to increased social tensions when nearby urban dwellers suffer a decline in living standards. González thus sought to integrate such urban spaces into the city’s identity and create new value while at the same time upgrading the living standards of local residents.

The Tokyo Foundation wishes her great success in her research and career pursuits.

Asha Gul, a 2016 Sylff fellow at the UNSW Australia Business School.

On November 2, 2016, UNSW Australia Business School celebrated the 25th anniversary of the Sylff program at the university.

UNSW became the thirtieth member of the Sylff community when an endowment was established at the Graduate School of Management in 1991, with the first Sylff fellows being selected in 1992. The school later became the Australian School of Business and is now called the UNSW Business School. To date, Sylff fellowships have supported 200 topnotch graduate students attending this world-renowned business school. At the celebration event, about 25 fellows and school representatives gathered to share memories with old friends and to meet new Sylff acquaintances.

The occasion was an opportunity to bring fellows from different generations together and strengthen their Sylff identity.

Professor Elizabeth Carson reads a letter from Mr. Sasakawa.

Four current fellows gave short presentations on their research and social engagement activities, such as those involving the teaching of business skills and the empowerment of women in local neighborhoods, demonstrating that Sylff fellows not only excel academically but also are change agents committed to the betterment of the community.

A fellow in the 1990s shared her experiences and noted that she still maintains the network that she developed with various Sylff institutions. She encouraged other fellows to take advantage of their membership in the global Sylff community.

Sylff’s distinctive features were emphasized in a congratulations letter from Mr. Yohei Sasakawa, chairman of the Nippon Foundation, which was delivered at the anniversary event by Professor and Acting Associate Dean of Research Elizabeth Carson. His message highlighted Sylff’s mission of developing socially engaged leaders and the access fellows gain to a global network of other fellows attending many of the world’s best universities.

Group photo with Sylff fellows.

The success of the program can be credited in large part to the hard work of Sylff steering committee members at the university. In her remarks at the gathering, Tokyo Foundation Director for Leadership Development Yoko Kaburagi expressed her sincere gratitude to the SSC members for their dedication to the administration of the program over the past 25 years.

The UNSW steering committee and the Tokyo Foundation will continue to work closely together in further enriching the Sylff experience, both during the fellowship period and throughout the fellows’ careers.

Happy New Year from Mr. Sasakawa and the Sylff Staff!

(Back row, from left) Yumi Arai, Tomoko Yamada, Keita Sugai, Yoko Kaburagi (Director), Takashi Suzuki
(Seated) Mari Suzuki (Director), Mana Sakamoto, Yohei Sasakawa (Chairman of the Nippon Foundation), Aya Oyamada, Sanae Oda (Executive Director).

The Sylff program will mark its 30th anniversary in 2017, when we will launch a number of new Sylff support programs to better meet fellows’ expectations and launch a Sylff Association to make sure we all stay connected.

SYLFF NEWS 2016

Hoshi, back row center, Voris to his left, and members of the Sylff team.

New Chair of the Board

In June, Takeo Hoshi, the Henri H. and Tomoye Takahashi Senior Fellow in Japanese Studies at Stanford University, joined the Tokyo Foundation as Chair of the Board. Before moving to Stanford in 2012, he taught at UC San Diego for over 20 years, where he served as chair of the Sylff Steering Committee. He congratulated Philip Voris on being selected a Sylff fellow at UC San Diego this year when the latter visited the Foundation in December.

Meeting of Chinese Sylff Administrators

On December 8 and 9, Sylff administrators at 10 Chinese universities (Fudan, Jilin, Lanzhou, Nanjing, Peking, Chongqing, Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, Yunnan, and Sun Yat-sen) gathered at Peking University to discuss plans for events to commemorate the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Sylff program at 10 Chinese institutions in 2017 and to review Sylff program operations and endowment management.

Sylff program administrators at 10 Chinese universities and members of the Tokyo Foundation.

UNSW Australia Celebrates 25th Sylff Anniversary

On November 2, UNSW Australia Business School in Sydney celebrated 25 years of Sylff with the participation of socially engaged fellows whom the School has supported over the years.

New Scheme

We are pleased to announce that 10 institutions have successfully signed agreements to join the new financial scheme as of December 2016. In 2016, fellowships were awarded to 38 graduate students from six institutions under the new scheme: Coimbra, Institute of Political Education “Pedro Arrupe,” Leipzig, Deusto, Comenius, and Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris. In 2017, these institutions will be joined by National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Ruhr University Bochum, University of Chile, and University of Belgrade.

SYLFF SUPPORT PROGRAMS

Five fellows received Sylff Leadership Initiatives awards in 2016, and 28 received Sylff Research Abroad grants. We look forward to receiving many more applications in 2017. We are currently conducting a survey on new support programs and are eager to receive comments from as many fellows as possible. More information about the survey is available at Survey on New Support Programs.

SYLFF@TOKYO

We welcomed many current and graduated fellows as well as Sylff administrators to the Tokyo Foundation in 2016.

December 20
UC San Diego Fellow Applying Cross-Cultural Experience in Pursuing International Affairs Degree

September 13
Sylff Scholars Discuss Their Social Initiatives, Meet with Mr. Sasakawa

June 16
Juilliard Fellow Hopes to Promote Multicultural Communication

June 6
Deepening Collaborative Ties with Portland State University

February 15
Jagiellonian University’s Prestigious Leadership Program

SYLFF WORLDWIDE

We’re happy to share news of notable achievements by Sylff fellows around the world:

July 20
Howard Research Week Highlights Partnership with Sylff Program

July 14
Jadavpur Fellows Visit Hansen’s Disease Patients in Kolkata

January 18
Dylan Corlay Wins Top Prize at Jorma Panula Conducting Competition

The Sylff program will mark its 30th anniversary in 2017, and on this occasion, the Tokyo Foundation plans to launch a number of new Sylff support programs to better fulfill fellows’ needs and expectations, especially those of graduated fellows. We hope to enhance the utility of the program for fellows around the world who are emerging as leaders in tackling global and local issues in their respective fields. This is in keeping with Sylff’s original goal of providing continuing, lifelong support for fellows.

We are eager to learn what you think of our ideas about new support initiatives. Please support this initiatives by sending us your response to the survey. More information is available at the following link : Survey on New Support Programs