It is commonly accepted that education, research and social contribution are the three major objectives of the university. The relative importance of each function is, however, not unanimously evaluated. In addition to our common understanding at JSSPRM that universities are important entities for science and technology, it is known that Japanese academicians, while being generally. regarded as educators by the administration, tend to prefer to qualify their principal attribute as researchers rather than educators, probably because of greater social recognition of research activities than education, and the importance of research performance as factor for their professional evaluation. Recently, however, the significance of the university education has been attracting attention in response to increased diversity of universities, employment difficulties graduates are facing, and decrease in the under-18 population. In fact, the university should be understood in both research and educational aspects. This is hopefully a promising research subject for JSSPRM with its membership of a variety of backgrounds.
