University Accreditation Results(Results for Certified Evaluation and Accreditation for university)

Japan Lutheran College

Basic Information of the Institution
Ownership: Private

Location: Tokyo, Japan

Accreditation Status
Year of the Review: 2017
Accreditation Status: accredited （Accreditation Period: April.01.2018 – March.31.2025）

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Certified Evaluation and Accreditation Results
for Japan Lutheran CollegeOverview
Japan Lutheran College (hereafter, the College) was founded in 1964 as Japan Lutheran
Theological College which was a single-department (Department of Theology) college for thepurpose of training pastors. Through reorganizations of faculties and departments and theestablishment of a graduate school, it is now a college comprised of the Faculty of Integrated
Human Studies and the Graduate School of Integrated Human Studies. With its campus inMitaka City, Tokyo, the College conducts education and research activities based on its
founding philosophy of “making Christ’s heart our heart.”
Following the accreditation review by Japan University Accreditation Association(JUAA) in 2010, the College underwent a drastic revision at the Reform Examination andPromotion Headquarters, conducted an extensive reorganization from a three-department
system to one-department and five-course system in 2014, and formulated a mid-term plan fora five-year period from 2016 and also developed a system to manage the progress of that plan.
Through these initiatives, the College is making efforts such as improving student enrollment,
but since students in the new department have not yet completed the full years of coursework,
the College is expected to verify the situation and work on further improvements in the future.
In this accreditation review, JUAA found it significant that the College takes
advantage of its unique features and systematically works on support for disabled students anddevelops support according to students’ needs such as one-on-one reading at the library, andthat as part of its social contribution activities it provides training for graduates and training for
professionals in the areas of psychology, social work and education and makes efforts towards
fostering community social work leaders.
However, the Faculty of Integrated Human Studies has an issue with a high limit of
the number of credits for which transfer students can register in the first year at the College,
and the graduate school also has issues such as inadequate contents in the degree award policy,
as well as inadequate development of thesis or specified assignments examination criteria in
the Master’s program, and issues with the curriculum of the Doctoral program. It is expected
the College will appropriately understand the current situation through self-study andevaluation, conduct verification and work toward improvements for further development.

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Notable Strengths
Student Support


The College established the Disabled Student Support Committee to enhance the support
system for disabled students, and it assigns disabled student advisers (teachers) anddisabled student coordinators (staff members), continuously conducts interviews before
disabled students join the College and provides detailed support according to each
student’s situation such as sign language interpreting and note taking in cooperation withthe Lutheran Support Service student volunteer circle. Further, disabled student coordinators(staff members) coordinate with the library in supporting vision-impaired students in classes
by digitizing course materials and providing one-on-one reading. It is commendable that theCollege utilizes its expertise in providing college-wide systematic support to disabledstudents in this way.

Social Cooperation and Contribution
The Comprehensive Clinical Consultation Center has three areas – clinical consultation,clinical thanatology research, and training – each of which provides consultations, research
programs and training related to nurturing professionals and managers for interpersonal
assistance in the fields of psychology, social work, and education. It provides opportunities
to acquire a high degree of skills to not only graduates and degree holders of the College
but also to professionals and organizations across Japan in the areas of psychology, social
work and education, in which participants work on research in line with issues in the field
and have produced results such as solving challenges. The Community Human Resource
Development Center works with the cities of Mitaka, Musashino and Koganei to holdCommunity Welfare Facilitator Training Courses to foster the abilities of citizens to planand carry out support activities on their own, and it has been nurturing human resources topromote community welfare through activities such as volunteer activities and community
activities for many years. It is commendable that the College gives the outcomes of its
education and research back to society through these initiatives to foster professionals andcommunity welfare leaders.

4Suggestions for Improvement
Educational Content, Methods, and Outcome

At the Graduate School of Integrated Human Studies, the degree award policy of theMaster’s of Social Work and the Doctor of Philosophy (Social Work), which were newly
established in 2017, does not show the learning outcomes such as knowledge and abilities
that students need to acquire to complete the program, and the degree award policy of theMaster of Arts in Clinical Psychology does not show the learning outcomes such asknowledge and abilities that students need to acquire to complete the program other thanfor the students who are to acquire the qualification of clinical psychotherapist or certified
public psychologist; this needs to be rectified.

The curriculum of the Doctor of Philosophy (Social Work) of the Graduate School ofIntegrated Human Studies is only composed of research supervision subjects with nospecification of credits and has no course work, which cannot be said to appropriately
combine research work and course work, so educational program appropriate to that
program needs to be offered in light of the purpose of the program-based graduate schoolsystem.

The maximum number of credits for which transfer students can register at the Faculty ofIntegrated Human Studies in the first year at the College is high at 54 credits. This issue
should be addressed in light of the purpose of the credit system.

The Graduate School of Integrated Human Studies has procedures to recognize acquired
credits in the graduate school rules, but there is no prescribed limit on the number ofcredits that can be recognized. This issue should be addressed.

The Master’s of Social Work at the Graduate School of Integrated Human Studies has noclearly separate examination criteria for Master’s theses and specified assignments. Thisissue should be addressed so that separate examination criteria are formulated.

5Administration and FinanceSince 2015, the ratio of the Excess Expenditure Carried forward to the next year toOperational Revenue (imputed income) has increased due to a reduction in income fromtuition and other student fees, and the ratio of the financial assets to the required reserve
fund has been reduced., it cannot be said that the financial base required to realize theeducation and research purposes and goals is adequate, so the College is expected toformulate a mid-to-long-term financial plan clarifying specific numerical targets and strive
to stabilize its financial basis.