By HAJIME UENO/ Staff Writer
November 19, 2022 at 15:27 JST
The University of Tokyo (Asahi Shimbun file photo)
Japan’s top university will hire around 300 female professors and associate professors by the 2027 school year to address a longstanding gender disparity at the faculty.
In an announcement released Nov. 18, the University of Tokyo said it would seek out new professors in a recruitment drive limited to women.
In total, 141 professors and 165 associate professors will be hired by 2027.
As of May, the institution popularly known as Todai had 274 female professors and associate professors, or about 12 percent of all professors and associate professors.
Todai will have around 400 female professors and associate professors in 2027 after taking retirement into account, according to university officials.
The university also plans to hire more female assistant professors and lecturers to ensure that women make up about 25 percent of the entire teaching staff.
It will offer gender training sessions directed at all of its teaching staff and establish new courses on gender studies for students.
“We will also conduct training sessions to deal with unconscious bias so the entire institution can undergo a major change in awareness,” said Todai Executive Vice President Kaori Hayashi.
“The ratio of female researchers in Japan is extremely low,” she noted. “Research shows that promoting diversity among researchers leads to further improvements in research quality.”
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