Initiatives and Practice of Compulsory Intellectual Property Education for All Departments in Ehime University

Abstract

Considering the social background with the demand for training of human resources in the intellectual property field and looking ahead to reorganization of faculties of science and technology in the 2019 academic year, the Center for General Education under the Education and Student Support Organization in Ehime University started discussion of introducing “intellectual property education” in faculties of sciences (faculties of science, medicine, engineering, and agriculture) in 2017. Between 2017 and 2018, the Ehime University Educational Reform Promotion Project implemented a program entitled “development and trial of intellectual education program recommended as general education for all departments.” In this program, students in humanities’ faculties were identified as having strong needs for intellectual property education. Thus, since the 2020 academic year, the general education program “Introduction to Intellectual Property” has become a compulsory subject for freshmen of all faculties. Learners’ results and questionnaire results show a high degree of understanding of learners in the compulsory subject and adequate quality of the class.