Associate Professor Yukiko Yamamoto (NipCA project), participated in the 65th Annual Meeting of the Comparative and International Education Society (CIES) held in Seattle, USA from April 25 to May 2, 2021. Although the conference was to be held in Seattle, Washington originally, all conference events were held online in response to the situation of the spread of the COVID-19 in the world. The theme of the conference this year was “Social Responsibility within Changing Contexts”. More than 3,000 researchers and practitioners in the field of comparative education from over 120 countries gathered for academic exchange during the conference.
On the first day of the conference, Monday, April 26, at 7:15 p.m. (Seattle local time), Prof. Yamamoto presented the paper titled “Factors Related to Productivity and Study Environment of Remote Learning under the COVID-19: A Case of Undergraduate Students in Japan” within the session of “Examining remote learning in Asia during COVID-19. This research was based on the results of online education of 2nd foreign language courses at the University of Tsukuba, which took place during the spring semester of 2020 to prevent the spread of the Covid-19. She explained the importance of the living arrangement of the students during disaster emergencies, such as Covid-19 crisis. Although most of the audience and panelists participated from Asia regions due to the time difference, they actively exchanged opinions on educational activities under the covid-19 crisis in their respective countries. Prof. Yamamoto was also asked to serve as a session chair on short notice. She stated the challenges and difficulties to participate in international conferences remain due to the time differences and limitation of networking; however, she was also grateful for the opportunity to present her research to the international audience.
