The first part of this article explains the meaning of the theme : “Professionalization and University”. The knowledge-driven society compels universities to develop new types of professional education.

　In the following parts I will examine the change of the legal rules of Japanese graduate schools and the impact of Houka Daigakuin (Japanese law school) system to the formation of Senmonshoku Daigakuin (Japanese professional graduate school) system. Then I discuss the differences between Senmonshoku Daigakuin and American professional school system. The latter should be the model of the former. But the founders of Senmonshoku Daigakuin system do not understand what is ‘profession’ and what is ‘professional’.

　 Finally I find that one but fundamental reason of the said misunderstanding comes from the Japanese language. We use vocabulary imported from China as academic language. There are, however, no words suited for ‘profession’ and professional in it.

　 Recently, the demand for professionally educated people has risen in Japan. This is due to increased globalization and a more competitive international environment. This study reviews a number of professional graduate programs. Some graduate programs such as within law and accounting faculties are closely linked with Japan’s qualification system. On the other hand, education and training for human resource management and other business studies, lack an accreditation system. In this paper, issues concerning professional education for human resource management and other business programs will be analysed in the framework of education and training in the corporate setting.

　 In North American society, the history of professional faculties can be traced back to the early 20th century. Accreditation and appraisal systems for both degree programs and faculties have developed and are now firmly established. The demand for professional education in North America has led to rigorous and specialist professional training. This is due to a strong relationship of demand and supply between society and the professional faculties in the United States. Is this the case in Japan? Is there a strong appraisal system of professionally qualified people and professional degree programs, in particular for human resource management and other business professionals?

　 This paper will firstly compare the professionalization of human resource management and related business studies, with other professional fields. The current context with regard to human resource management is examined. The proposed MOT program, which is anticipated to provide a new direction for education and training in a corporate setting, is analysed.

　 In this paper, focus is put on school teachers (general teacher and administrator). First study is made of what competence is desired on the current conditions of teachers (such as unbalanced age structure).

　 Secondly, while suggestion is given by examples of posting school principals from non-educational fields about competence required on school administrators, examination is made on how this competence should be improved, based on features of pre-posting training at the board of education and school examples of principals posted from non-educational fields.

　 Thirdly, standing on pre-condition that the partnership between university and the board of education is unavoidable as means of raising and improving of teacher’s competence, roles to be played by these schools should be studied.　 Fourthly, especially as the higher standardization of competency of administrators in schools, future possibility of school principals in Japan is examined, while checking roles to be played by post-graduate schools in the U.S.A.

　 As for roles to be played by university toward the improvement of teacher’s competence, there is, in general, in-service training fields, etc., a gradual development of cooperation between university and the board of education toward the improvement of competence in school leaders in this case, minding problems of cooperation, for example, merit or demerit disclosed in training American management staff. It will become necessary to employ career-staff in various fields at universities.

　 Employment with limited terms is also effective in terms of the activation of employment methods. There is room to check teaching methods, corresponding trainees’ needs, under partnerships with plural universities according to each strategic area.

　 Nation-wide support is the lesson, in order to link the administrator training system at graduate school with the qualification system.

　 Recent developments in health sciences, medical practice and technology, requires further development of medical professionals, such as medical doctors, dental doctors, pharmacists, nurses, occupational therapists, physical therapists, speech therapists, clinical technologists, radiological technologists, social workers, psychotherapists and others. These professionals have requested highly advanced higher education.

　 While the numbers of universities for medical and dental doctors have been limited over the last three decades, institutions offering four year courses for nurses have increased from a few, to approximately 100 in the last decade, mainly by transition from three to four year courses. Institutions offering four year courses for other co-medical professionals have also been similarly increasing.

　 The acceleration of educational reforms into medical and dental universities offering six year courses is required following the report of a Ministry of Education and Sciences’ committee in 2001. The report requires new core curriculum aimed to develop clinical ability to international standards during higher education. The reforms include:

　 ・Early clinical exposure in the freshman years;

　 ・The development of problem based learning activities within the curricula from basic medical sciences, clinical application to clinical diagnosis and therapy;

　 ・Learning attitudes and various diagnostic techniques in clinics and the practice of objective structured clinical examination (OSCE); and

　 ・Role play to develop an understanding of clinical relationships with patients.

　 The curricula for co-medical professionals, other than that for medical and dental professionals, is underdeveloped with regard to working together with other medical staffs, including doctors, in a clinical team, and the understanding of the clinical relationship with patients.

　 The Corporate University (CU) is usually a strategic initiative of a company by which all levels of employees (and sometimes customers and suppliers) participate in learning experiences necessary for the improvement of job performance and the enhancement of business capabilities. It is estimated that more than 2,000 CUs exist in the United States, although this figure may be inflated.

　 Japanese companies have in the past been renowned for their enthusiasm for the education and training of employees. However, companies’ investment in human resource management in Japan has declined through the 1990s ; by 2000 it was almost half that of major corporations in the US and Europe. To change this situation, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry has recommended the introduction of CU and an American style occupation based accreditation system in Japan.

　 In this paper, the history, definition and variations of the CU are described, and major CU cases are discussed. These are General Electric and Motorola in the US, and Toyota in Japan.

　 The major findings are as follows:

　 1. The establishment of CU requires a change in the education and training policy of the corporation from traditional low cost and low return models to those that commit a high investment in anticipation of a high return. Japanese companies have demonstrated in the past that this change is beneficial.

　 2. CU activities in the US such as leadership development and education in corporate values, are relatively new to the Japanese corporation. These activities, and courses developing the skills and knowledge required for management and business administration, should be provided by the CU in Japan.

　 3. Some CUs operate co-operative programs with the university sector, or sell educational services outside of the corporation. This implies that these courses may not just develop corporate specific knowledge and skill, but knowledge and skills with more general application. This trend may be a good stimulant for post secondary vocational education and training.

　 4. Japan should give high priority to human resource development as an interministerial government policy.

　 On December 20th, 2003, I was at Okuma Memorial Lecture hall of Waseda University, where the foundation meeting of the Japanese association of Houka Daigakuin (Japanese law schools) was being held. All authorities who had led the Japanese judicial system reform and the executives of law schools all over the country were in the hall. I was impressed that a person, who was usually very cool, said in excitement “I had never imagined this kind of day had become real!”

　 There is some possibility that Houka Daigakuins would change not only the way of training of lawyers but also the whole scene of Japanese higher education. The introduction of this system is a major step amongst all recent efforts reforming higher education systems. But the actual settings bear many significant problems.

　 In this article I tried to seek the meaning of foundation of Houka Daigakuin system and the assignments for it.

　 In recent years, National Council for Higher Education has reported an increase in the importance of liberal education in Japanese universities. However, an evaluation by the National Institution for Academic Degrees and University Evaluation (NIAD-UE) found an absence of the assessment of outcomes of liberal education. The major purpose of this article is to show how it becomes possible to improve the quality of liberal education by using outcomes assessment.

　 The fundamental difficulty in applying outcomes assessment to liberal education is that there is no consensus amongst faculties on what constitutes liberal education. That is because Japanese liberal education (“Kyouyou” education) is not on a disciplinary basis. In order to resolve this problem, the following prerequisites have to be addressed.

　 Firstly, educational objectives need to be clear and specific with identified operational objectives. The present objectives set for liberal education are too general. This commonly makes it difficult for faculties to understand their meaning and allows for broad interpretation. Consequently there is little agreement on the intended learning outcomes. Educational objectives must be able to provide clear direction for instructional activity.

　 Secondly, the validity of the objectives must be reviewed continuously by indirect assessment. Indirect assessment, analysing students’ views of educational outcomes, is normally used to complement direct assessment which focuses upon objective testing and performance measures. However, in the case of liberal education, while the achievement of objectives is assured by direct assessment, the appropriateness of the objectives themselves must be verified by indirectassessment.

　 Intended outcomes of “Kyouyou” education are similar to the outcomes of generic skills education in European countries and of liberal/general education in the United States. Nevertheless, expectations of the outcomes of liberal education are still very diverse in Japan. Whether the application of consistent outcomes isrealised or not is one of the factors that will determine the future of Japanese higher education.

　 The role of administrative staff in universities is currently an important issue for higher education in Japan. Since the late 1990s it has been the subject of frequent discussion, often concerning practical issues regarding administrative staff and/or university administration and proposals to resolve them. However, there remain some important issues concerning administrative staff which have not yet been clearly discussed. What are the actual roles of administrative staff? What kinds of abilities are required of them? In this article, the discussion regarding administrative staff in Japanese universities is reviewed. The article then draws clear conclusions based upon empirical data.

　 Data was gathered through the conduct of a questionnaire survey. The survey was distributed to chief administrative officers of all four year private universities in Japan. The article refers to two points. Firstly, what kinds of abilities are required of administrative staff, and how may administrative staff be trained in these abilities? Secondly, it is argued that administrative staff should become more integrated in university decision making. At this point in time however, how do they get involved in these activities and to what extent?

　 The following conclusions may be drawn from the survey :

1. In terms of required abilities there are many differences between roles.

2. In-house training is commonly used to develop staff abilities. However, in house training does not address the required abilities identified in one above. Therefore, there should be a re-consideration of what in-house training is required and whether another means to develop required abilities should be provided.

3. In many universities, administrative staff can get involved in the process of decision making to some degree, but it is still thought that the degree of staff participation is not enough. The participation of administrative staff in university decision making is still under development.

　 This paper analyses some of the particular problems found in masters programs in engineering education, where the delivery of these programs has reached the “massification stage”. Masters programs are analysed using two indices ; the degree of satisfaction of the students, and the degree of student motivation. We hypothesise that if at least one index is not high, then the masters program will have problems. Then two questions are presented ; firstly, which type of university is more likely to have problems? Secondly, how can we understand the background to these problems?

　 The data is collected from a questionnaire survey conducted in January and February of 2002. The major findings can be summarized as follows:

1. There are more students with a low degree of satisfaction and a low degree of motivation in NLUPU (Non Leading Universities-Public),and in some LU (Leading Universities).

2. The reasons why there are more students in NLUPU and in some LU who show a low degree of satisfaction are as follows : in the case of the NLUPU, it is because of inadequate equipment in the institution, and in the case of LU, it is because neither educational timetabling nor educational method are meeting student needs.

3. The reasons why more students have a low degree of motivation are the same for both NLUPU and LU : many students do not have sufficient pre-requisite knowledge for study in a masters course, and they do not connect their present major with future employment opportunities.

4. While the degree of satisfaction and motivation are determined by different factors, they both have an independent positive influence. Therefore, efforts to raise students’ degree of satisfaction will result in strengthening their motivation.

　 The implications of this empirical analysis are discussed ; firstly, whether the thesis which assumes that massification will bring fewer problems to LUs is adequate, and secondly, the need for academics and government agencies to consider reform according to the type of university.