Over the July 4 weekend, five ICU students arrived in New York City as the pioneering participants in Global Link, a new summer program administered by the Japan ICU Foundation. The seven-week long program matches each student with a volunteer position in an organization in Manhattan. Each week, the students pursue their volunteer work from Monday – Thursday and then on Fridays the JICUF has organized a series of leadership development, team-building and cultural events for the group. Ultimately, Global Link aims to expose ICU students to a global city (NYC) and a new skill set while also benefiting the organization they are placed with. In the following, I sketch the development of Global Link, introduce the student participants and discuss various activities we have planned for the students.

As part of our most recent strategic planning session, the JICUF agreed to “explore the possibility of special activities for ICU students studying in North America.” Although all of our work is for the benefit of ICU, most of our programs are run on the ICU campus, 6,500 miles away from our offices in New York City. With this in mind, we decided to design and administer a program for ICU students here in North America. Global Link is the result of our planning.

The inaugural Global Link participants are Paul Clark, Chie Hirata, Honami Iizuka, Anan Ogawa and JiYeon Yoo. Here is some basic information about the five participants.

Paul Clark

Citizenship – United States
Major – Media Culture and Communication
Expected Year of Graduation – 2016
Volunteer Host Organization – Japan ICU Foundation & Infinite Family

Chie Hirata

Citizenship – Japan
Major – undecided
Expected Year of Graduation – 2017
Volunteer Host Organization – NTV International

Honami Iizuka

Citizenship – Japan
Major – International Relations/Politics
Expected Year of Graduation – 2015
Volunteer Host Organization – Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs

Anan Ogawa

Citizenship – Japan
Major – Economics/International Relations
Expected Year of Graduation – 2015
Volunteer Host Organization – Asia Society

JiYeon Yoo

Citizenship – South Korea
Major – Business
Expected Year of Graduation – 2015
Volunteer Host Organization – PM+CO

In addition, three of the five students have already written self-introductions. Here are the links:

Paul Clark
Chie Hirata
Honami Iizuka

Keep your eyes out for the last two self-introductions, which will be published on our website later this summer. Finally, here are some of the activities that the Japan ICU Foundation has organized for the Global Link students so far this summer.

– Luncheon at the Permanent Mission of Japan to the United Nations, hosted by Japanese Ambassador to the United Nations, H.E. Mr. Motohide Yoshikawa, followed by information session with UNDP and tour of UN Headquarters. Ambassador Yoshikawa is an ICU alumnus.

– Visit to Coney Island and Brooklyn Cyclones baseball game, attended both by Global Link students and visiting members of the ICU Baseball Team.

– Career event with ICU OYR alumnus Ichizo Umehara. Ichizo is a tech entrepreneur with a BA from the University of Virginia and MBA from Columbia.

– Weekend retreat at Cross Roads Camp and Retreat Center in rural New Jersey, which included a hike on the Appalachian Trail and tubing on the Delaware River.

– Visit to the 9/11 Memorial Museum and Wall Street.

– Co-sponsoring event with Japan-America Student Conference. The event is tilted “Hiroshima to Fukushima: Hibakusha’s Stories.”