Inseikai Tohoku is the official romanized name of 院生会東北大学.
Full name: Graduate Student Association in Economics & Management, Tohoku University
The organization was fully renovated in February 2022 and has gradually become one of the most active and innovative academic organizations at Tohoku University. Here is a look back on our 2022.
1. Members as of 2022
We have organized 2 rounds of recruitment for research seats in April and October 2022. The numbers of both sitting members and steering members have increased significantly.
Number of INSEIKAI TOHOKU members
School year Distribution
Gender Distribution
Labs Distribution
Nationality Distribution
In 2023, we will start our first round of recruitment in April. We expect these numbers to increase even more. Our board members should also expand and become more active in organizing future Inseikai events.
2. Events
The total number of events in the Year 2022 is 14, of which 11 events were organized solely by INSEIKAI Tohoku.
| Date | Event | Organizer |
|---|---|---|
| 2/18/2022 | First Board Meeting | inseikai |
| 5/20/2022 | Spring Welcome Event | inseikai |
| 6/17/2022 | BBQ with new members | inseikai |
| 7/28/2022 | Special Seminar: What are the roles of government for facilitating high-tech industries | other |
| 7/22/2022 | Summer Talks | inseikai |
| 9/13/2022 | Seminar Writing Skills in Economics (with Turkish researchers) | inseikai |
| 9/16/2022 | Second RCPD Seminar on Economics (with Turkish researchers) | inseikai |
| 9/21/2022 | Lab Cleaning Day | inseikai |
| 10/13/2022 | Tohoku Uni Modern Economics Seminar | TUMES |
| 10/22/2022 | Autumn Welcoming Event | inseikai |
| 10/25/2022 | Lecture on Econometrics (with German researchers) | inseikai |
| 10/28/2022 | Seminar on Econometrics (with German researchers) | inseikai |
| 12/1/2022 | Tohoku Uni Modern Economics Seminar | TUMES |
| 12/18/2022 | Christmas Party | inseikai |
| Total (organized by inseikai) | 11 | |
| Total (including joint promotion) | 14 |
Summary
By kinds of events
In 2023, we already planned at least 4 big events. The first is Winter Talk about Start-ups: The Ways of Business presented by our 2 steering members, scheduled for January 18, 2023. The second big event is the recruitment for April 2023. The third event is the First DATEcon Awards, aiming to promote working papers in the department. The event includes papers from different fields and they will compete for 4 prizes in a Final Presentation on February 15, 2023. Lastly, we are going to organize a series of seminars in Computation, Mathematics, and Qualitative Research for graduate students to equip and enhance their research skills. This series has been scheduled for late February and March 2023.
3. Academic Achievements
Here is the listing of some publications in 2022 by our members.
- Huang, W., & Ichikohji, T. (2022). Do Dynamic Capabilities Facilitate Business Model Innovation In Small And Medium-Sized Chinese Family Companies?. International Journal of Innovation Management, 26(06), 2250040.
- Li, A., Sato, T., & Matsuda, Y. (2022). Spatial analysis of subjective well-being in Japan. Japanese Journal of Statistics and Data Science, 1-24.
- Zhao, Z., & Ohseto, S. (2022). Strategy-proof and fair reallocation with single-peaked preferences. Social Choice and Welfare, 58(4), 791-800.
- Tran, Q. T. (2022). The aging tax on potential growth in Asia. Journal of Asian Economics, 81, 101495.
- Chen, G & Hibiki,A (2022) ” Can the Carbon Emission Trading Scheme Influence Industrial Green Production in China?”, Sustainability, Vol.14, No. 23, 15829
- Uliczka, N (2023) “When the Celtic Tiger relaxed its corporate tax bite: An analysis of effects on top and upper middle income shares in Ireland”, Economic Letters, Vol.222, No.1, 110933
We acknowledge that many of our members are constantly writing and revising their papers. We believe the year 2023 will continue to see more and more publications by Inseikai members.
4. History of Inseikai’s Reborn
Struggling Time
Inseikai used to be run by just one Japanese graduate student (Yu Tomita). He was a hard-working and dedicated person, but working alone means he could not organize so many events or stay connected with many graduate students. The organization was kept internally, without branding, without websites, or with other useful channels to promote people joining inseikai.
The Covid-19 that spanned over 3 years was also devastating to inseikai due to our inability to organize events or accept new members. Covid-19 revealed many shortcomings and weaknesses that this organization. For instance, inseikai’s job was to manage the research room (hereafter called Lab) only, which is extremely limited, and the communication between inseikai and other graduate students, as well as the professors, was not very strong and responsive.
On the brink of elimination, we had an Emergency meeting with all current members on February 7, 2022, to resolve the concurrent issues and restructure inseikai. Fortunately, inseikai still had some passionate members who cared about the existence of this organization, they did not want inseikai to cease to exist. With unanimous votes of confidence, inseikai had reached the following new decisions.
- Mr. Tran Quang-Thanh, who can speak both Japanese and English well, to become the new president (D1)
- Other board members who help him would include Niklas Uliczka, Rashed Al Jayousi, Haruo Ogawa, Zhao Yikai, and Dai Runyu, who were having seats at the Labs and are highly motivated.
- Professor Hioki became our supervisor. He is extremely helpful and considerate about inseikai Tohoku.
We had our first board member meeting on February 18, 2022, and from that moment onward, inseikai has constantly been expanding further.
The New Era
Restructuring Lab Management
The first action we took upon having new members was to organize systematically the onboarding procedure, that is, how new members can join inseikai and apply for a seat. We currently have 2 Labs at the C-14 Building and 5 Labs at the C-13 Building making it a total of 7 Labs. To manage all Labs,
- We assigned 2 committee members to supervise each Lab.
- We also collected all sitting users’ emails in as much detail as possible. (at that time, around 10 but has increased to 45 as of now).
- We examined the keys and lab equipment to ensure people have nice seats for studying and conducting research.
First Expansion
With the new committee members active, we managed to distribute lab seats to members in a more accessible way. We made a map of all Labs, determined all available seats, made registration forms for newcomers, and assembled a concentrated key distribution date. We also promote inseikai by attending the orientation for even the Japanese programs. In the end, we increased the Lab users from 15 to 69 (as of December 2022).
New Logo, New Emails, New Website, New Motto
I sense that inseikai can become something big, something that graduate students of Tohoku’s Graduate School of Economics and Management can be proud of. For that to happen, we need new branding. Thus, we created a new website.
with the motto: RESEARCH. TOGETHER. STRONG.
Because we want everyone in this inseikai to feel at home, to be motivated by each other, and to grow strong together.
Inseikai Tohoku 