In 1965, it was approved to operate the predecessor of Urayama Gakuen, vocational school of Chuo Yobiko (Central Preparatory School), which opened in the next year, in April 1966. In December of the same year, it was approved as Associate school corporation Urayama Gakuen. In 1968, Urayama Gakuen's first vocational school opened (Chuo Keizai Technical School, later renamed as Toyama Keizai Technical School and further, Toyama Technical School of Information Business). In 1996, Urayama Gakuen was approved as a school corporation from an associate school corporation, and in the following year 1997, Toyama College of Welfare Science opened.

In the 55 years since the founding of Urayama Gakuen (Gakuen), each school under Gakuen has expanded, reorganized, and renamed departments and majors in response to the needs of the times and the region. Today, Gakuen consists of three schools: Bit, Toyama College of Welfare Science (both in Imizu City, Toyama Prefecture) and Kanazawa Chuo Preparatory School (Kanazawa City, Ishikawa Prefecture).

Among them, Bit consists of the following 8 departments and 14 majors (including 2 Departments (Architecture and Design, and of Civil Service) and 4 majors of them will be established in April 2022) and 1 graduate school (Graduate School of Medical Information Management): 1) Department of Information Systems (Programming Major, Robot / IoT Major, Cloud Major and Game Creator Major), 2) Department of Web Creators (Web Creator Major), 3) Department of Hotel and Wedding (Hotel and wedding Major), 4) Department of Architecture and Design (Licensed Architect Major, Architecture CAD Major and Surveyor Major), 5) Department of Medical Administration (Medical Administration Major and Pharmaceutical Registered Seller Major), 6) Civil Service Department (Civil Service Major), 7) International Business Department (International Business Major), and 8) Japanese Language Department (Japanese Language Major).

Toyama College of Welfare Science consists of four departments: 1) Department of Social Welfare, 2) Department of Nursing, 3) Department of Early Childhood Education, and 4) Department of International Tourism.

Mr. Tetsuro Urayama, Chairman of Urayama Gakuen School Corporation

Bit is based on the founding spirit of the school: "Formation of Simple and cheerful personality" and " Formation of personality that contributes to society through specialized academics and its application". Further, Bit collaborates with the local community to embody the concept of "Community and academy integrated as one", aiming to be an educational and research institute as a base for solving regional problems. Bit promotes exchanges with local governments and local business circles, and at the same time, in order to lead to human resource development required in the region, a system has been built up that reflects the needs of the local community in the curriculum organization of specialized courses and reorganization of departments and majors.

As part of this, as mentioned above, the Department of Architecture and Design, consisting of three majors, will be established in April 2022. This is due to the remarkable decline in the 18-year-old population in Toyama Prefecture, which is greater than the nationwide, as well as the awareness of the actual situation that has led to outflow of high school graduates out of the prefecture due to restrictions on more advanced educational opportunities in the architectural field, and the needs of human resources in the prefecture in the field. There was also a desire to create an environment for high school students, where they can learn in the prefecture and increase the options for learning, according to Principal Noto.

Bit also emphasizes human resource development that adapts to the needs of the times. Apart from the specialized knowledge of each major, the educational goal is to develop professionals who have “comprehensive human skills” rich in sociality, creativity, and internationality. As its original specific plans, Bit has made general subjects common to all departments available: 1) "NIB (Newspaper Utilization Course)" to correctly read and express information with the cooperation of local newspapers, 2) "Data marketing" to learn how to analyze data using big data, and 3) "Expressive power" to learn expressiveness and communication skills through theater, etc. In addition, as the fourth mainstay, "ICT utilization" is newly positioned to learn presentation techniques using VR based on UC-win/Road.

On the other hand, from fiscal 2020, the entire Gakuen has developed the "Smart Campus Concept". Its aim is to make full use of groupware to improve the efficiency of schoolwork through paperless and cashless work, to facilitate communication with students, as well as to produce students who are well adapted and acquainted with such advanced technologies.

Class of learning with VR

They started to think of introducing UC-win/Road in early 2020, when the idea of opening Department of Architecture and Design in Bit was raised, says Principal Noto. While investigating various things to find out what the latest building technology is in order to handle it in the department to be newly established, they paid attention to VR, which has been spread more and more when presenting the completed image of the structure to customers from the design stage. In particular, they have arrived at FORUM8 having cutting-edge approaches in the area. In the summer of the same year, Principal Noto visited FORUM8's Tokyo headquarters with Mr. Tetsuro Urayama, Chairman of Urayama Gakuen, and Mr. Michito Matsumoto, President of Toyama College of Welfare Science. In addition to touching various simulation examples, they actually experienced UC-win/Road. Under such a process, they came up with a method that students express what they imagine individually in a virtual space and present them using them. As they were convinced of various possibilities of VR technology as a presentation tool that goes beyond the architecture field, they have officially adopted UC-win/Road in accordance with the change in school regulations for the next year in the fall of the same year. In response to this, Use of UC-win/Road in classes of Bit began in "ICT utilization" in the second half of the first year of the Department of Hotel and Wedding in September 2021, ahead of other departments.
		Mr. Kazuhide Noto, Principal of Toyama College of Business and Information Technology, Urayama Gakuen School Corporation

In the class, they first explain the basics of how to use UC-win/Road through the process of generating 3D space from map and terrain data and creating road structures such as roads, intersections, traffic lights, etc. Then the students create a school route about an 8-minute walk from the nearest station, “Kosugi Station of Ainokaze Toyama Railway” to the campus with 3DVR. The students also learn how to create and edit parts such as chairs and desks that are likely to be used in hotels with CG according to their major field using another game engine or Shade3D, an integrated 3DCG software of FORUM8.

Prof. Shinpei Yamamoto, Chief of the Department of Information Systems (in charge of the Game Creators Major), Toyama College of Business and Information Technology, Urayama Gakuen School Corporation

After covering that much in the current class, the final goal of the following first half of the 2nd-year (2022 fiscal year) class is to make presentation in a hotel in the VR space created by students themselves, says Mr. Shinpei Yamamoto, Chief of the Department of Information Systems of Bit (in charge of the Game Creators Major), who is in charge of the class. In addition, from fiscal 2022, it is planned to start "ICT utilization" classes in the same way in all the departments of Bit. At that time, since UC-win/Road was originally incorporated as a new presentation tool related to specialized fields, VR representation that are suitable for the characteristics of each department will be required. Although the specific contents of classes and guidance system for and after the new fiscal year have not been finalized yet, it is expected that multiple faculty members who are familiar with the contents of each department will share and improve the work while feeding back each other's experience with the preceding Professor Yamamoto. "I thought that there would be a little difficult part for students whose majors were far from VR, but students are doing it more happily than I thought." In addition to being the first VR class for himself, Professor Yamamoto was concerned about how to motivate students in the Hotel and Wedding Department, which deals with totally different practical work from the Department of Information Systems of which he takes charge. However, when it started, he said that it was a complete sense of utter anxiety, and that students seemed to be working with great curiosity, perhaps because of their affinity for ICT.

Prof. Yamamoto expressed his view that "opportunities to utilize VR environments will definitely increase." By experiencing this when they are still students, the affinity for VR technology should increase. He hopes that they will make VR their own strength even among ICTs, which will continue to evolve further in the future, from his standpoint of taking responsibility of VR classes. On the other hand, Principal Noto pointed out the importance of education in response to changes in society, looking hard at the future when the children who start learning in an advanced ICT environment at the elementary school enter their school. What’s more, he mentions the significance of the school's stance of consistently keeping an eye on the needs of the times and local communities. "The start was to use VR as one of our presentation tools, but now we would like to become able to reproduce a variety of scenes in the virtual space and use avatars to practice service treatment as well as English conversation." Since diverse VR spaces will be created through "ICT utilization" classes to be spread throughout all departments in the future, they are willing to lead to the creation of environment where they can be effectively utilized on the platform. This is what Principal Noto is drawing the following VR development, with a view to introducing F8VPS of FORUM8.

Soba making Hands-on class planned in the future