Two students had the wonderful opportunity to join staff and management at the JR Kyushu Station Hotel Kokura. At JR Kyushu Station Hotel Kokura, the students would spend 2 nights and 3 days at the hotel. The internship started on September 4 and ended on September 6. Students would be given opportunities to learn about different areas with the hotel; the restaurant, and the front reception. Both students arrived at the hotel dressed professionally and demonstrating a positive attitude towards their internship.

In our next blog about their internship, students will share with us what they did during their 3-day internship and what they learned from their time in the tourism business. They will tell us about life in the hotel business!

Sunday Morning Factory is a social business enterprise which is a part of Borderless Japan Corporation. It is based in Fukuoka city but it has a manufacturing facility in Bangladesh. This internship is an interesting one because it gave students the opportunity to experience a workplace which is actively engaged in trying to achieve a number of different SDG’s. Of course, SDG 1 – No Poverty, is central to its core business philosophy but it also aims to impact on SDG 5 - Gender Equality, SDG 4 – Quality Education and Reduced Inequalities – SDG 10. This is of particular interest to our students as they are learning about SDG’s in their classes. Therefore, an opportunity such as this one, to experience first-hand the efforts of a Japanese company which is tackling these SDG’s on a daily basis is invaluable.

Four students were chosen to participate in this internship. And all four were actively engaged in preparing for a conference call to Bangladesh when I visited them on the second day of their internship. Students were very professional in their approach and they were very eager to learn a lot from the internship. I also had the opportunity to observe the students as they participated in a conference call with an employee in Bangladesh and they were both confident and professional in how they spoke and behaved during the conference call. Again, in our next blog students will share with us what they did and what they learned from their internship.