Baton passed from ACT-I to ACT-X

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Advice: "Be free to think independently, promote your own research, and become a leading expert in your field.

The ACT-I was designed with the aim of supporting young researchers with "passion," with an emphasis on helping them to "establish themselves.

Following the success of ACT-I, its successor program, JST ACT-X, continues to develop as "a program that hopes to establish individual young researchers

1 ) Supporting young researchers to "establish themselves

(2) Support young researchers to promote challenging research and development while taking the initiative with free ideas.

Introduced "an immediate and confidential communication environment through text chat tools" to the interview screening process.

Text communication in Slack

Communication between the research director, area advisors, and JST staff on their own computers

Not visible to applicants.

Exchange opinions during presentations and during questioning.

Share what opinions and questions you had while listening to the interview presentation.

Able to traffic what the research director wants the area advisor to hear in the Q&A session.

Slack implementation has been dramatically superior

Screening of a large number of applicants and diverse disciplines made possible based on in-depth discussions

Impossible to just use the usual method of filling out the evaluation sheet after the presentation and sharing that file.

In ACT-I, the standard period of support was set at 1.5 years, and an additional accelerated phase period of 2 years was set for about one-third of the standard period by JST.

Explicit notice that the standard period is the heart of ACT-I's support

We need to make sure that those who were not selected as Super Creators can be proud to be "graduates".

We must ensure that those who did not advance to the Unexplored Advanced are not regarded as "those who could not lead to commercialization".

Additional support was made available on request.

In fact, many do not wish to.

3 ．Act-I "Information and the Future" area meeting devised by

A place for friendly competition and mutual inspiration

Foundation for future collaboration

be memorable

It is important to provide opportunities for human interaction

It is difficult for about 70 people to interact with each other in a friendly and memorable way by simply repeating 70 short presentations and Q&A sessions, as is typical at academic conferences.

(i) Creating an active voice environment through text chat

When you have a simple question about the content of a presentation that is far away from your area of expertise, it is less psychologically challenging to post it in a chat room.

Other audience members with close expertise provided supplementary explanations, which deepened the understanding of the audience as a whole.

Gives more feedback than the usual questioning

Visualize what a large audience thought of your presentation

Slack content displayed on a small screen in front so that it could be read

(ii) Use of large, easy-to-read name tags

Postcard-sized nameplate with last name in a large, prominent font

Print the same information on both sides of the nameplate so that the first and last name can be read even if the nameplate is turned over.

Also include the title of the research project

The color of the nameplate was changed for each fiscal year so that students could easily identify their peers.

(iii) Seat assignment

To make it easier to talk to people you have never talked to before and to promote interdisciplinary exchange

All seating in the presentation rooms and at lunch and dinner were reserved.

Once you talk next to each other, it will be easier to talk during breaks, etc.

Reflection with KPT

All participants reflect on the domain meeting and write a 5-minute summary in Slack at the end of each meeting.

An average of about 149 entries are written.

Area Advisor Talks and Research Summary Talks: 5-minute talks per person when time permits on the program.

Content is left up to the speaker

Alumni Session

Researchers (graduates) who have completed their research term may voluntarily participate in area meetings upon agreeing to a confidentiality agreement.

After 2020, when the number of presenters will be reduced, we will have time for alumni to report on their recent activities.

is "voluntary" meaning "available to those who wish to participate"?

If that's the case, then the route is a little different from the unexplored IT that "participates at the request of the PM"

In the fifth year (2006) after this trial began, Unexplored said, "By all means, come on over in droves!"

Since 2008, there have been so many people who wanted to participate that the time for alumni to report on their recent activities has been overflowing.

After that, they stopped taking requests to participate.

The four regional meetings after FY2020 will be held using Zoom.

The audience always showed up, too, and we made an effort to clearly state the family name and the year of adoption.

The ability to see each other's faces during breaks and other times of the day made it possible to interact in a chat-like manner.

get-together

Zoom's Breakout Room

Random forced shuffling every 15 minutes

Advantages for alumni to participate remotely

Definitely useful as a work-around for a time when it was not possible to hold a physical at COVID19

Ditto the benefit of facilitating alumni participation.

There is fatigue due to prolonged periods of constant frontal viewing.

There is a psychological hurdle to starting a conversation in a general shared setting during breaks.

When you go to the person you want to talk to in a physical holding and start talking, you start with a conversation between two people, and that conversation is visible to those around you, so people can gradually join in.

Zoom starts with a whole broadcast.

I think this is the degree to which Zoom's UI could be improved in this area.

is not very good, and in 2021, the management allocated (rather than randomizing the system) to Zoom's breakout room

Close to [Reserved seat method

4 ．Act-I "Information and the future" ingenuity in the debriefing session of the results of the

ACT-I Advanced Research Forum, a public forum for the presentation of results

A place that attracts attention in an atmosphere different from that of a regular conference presentation

It is important to provide "a place where people feel it is worth presenting.

Professionally staged and hosted stage

High-impact visual and musical effects when researchers take the stage

Opening and closing videos are shown at the beginning and at the end of the entire event.

Attractively designed pamphlets distributed at the event

I wish I could afford more, but it looks like I can't.

Archives are also important

Video recordings of the presentations and posters were made continuously available on the Internet for anyone to view.

In addition, the videos of boost meetings and interim presentations are stored in the private Scrapbox, in addition to the publicly available "results reports.

Participants from the next and subsequent years can see "what last year's participants presented" and have the opportunity to learn about the project development process

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