1. Initiatives for the Educational Business
Initiatives for the Educational Business
The KADOKAWA Group runs educational businesses for students to learn about diversity and how to interact with local communities while also offering the opportunity to receive practical and professional education to even more people.
Providing Educational Content and Learning Services
DWANGO Co., Ltd. provides proprietary educational content and learning services to N High School and S High School (N/S High Schools) operated by Kadokawa Dwango Educational Institute. Using interactive educational services designed for the Internet era as well as experiential learning services utilizing VR, students at N High School and S High School study curricula daily to earn a high school diploma using computers, smartphones, tablets, VR goggles, and other digital tools. Since the opening of N High School in 2016, the number of students has increased significantly, and we currently provide educational opportunities to 24,642 students nationwide together with S High School (opened in April 2021) as of March 31, 2023.
In N and S High School, students devote their free time to what they want to learn, as they can study efficiently whenever and wherever they want. In addition to university entrance exam support, programing, and language study, the schools offer educational programs to experience actual agriculture and fishing across Japan, study abroad programs, other extracurricular programs, and activities to study esports, investing, and starting businesses from former professional athletes and experts so that students can learn about collective strengths while also valuing their own autonomy. The schools have also prepared spaces for learning how to contribute to diversity and the local community, by organizing talk events with expert guests based on themes such as careers for LGBTQ+ sexual minorities and diversity & inclusion, and by running projects for proposing plans to solve social issues in cooperation with local governments, companies, universities, non-profit organizations, and specialists across Japan. These projects include, among other things, planning a sustainable toy set with McDonald's Holdings Company (Japan), Ltd. and producing a handbook with Japan Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals to raise awareness about pet issues.
In 2022, N High School was included in the top three schools providing advanced education in the Innovation division of World’s Best School Prizes organized by T4 Education, a British organization for educational support. N High School has been recognized as one of the world’s top schools for three consecutive years, being included in T4 Education’s selection of the world’s 100 best schools in 2020 and 2021.
School Operating Business
Vantan Inc. operates 15 vocational schools on fashion, graphic design, games, the video business, pastry chefs, cafes, creators and influencers in entertainment. For example, KADOKAWA DWANGO Academy of Technology (opened in April 2020, school name changed from VANTAN TECHFORD ACADEMY in July 2023) aims to develop the next-generation of IT human resources: VANTAN CREATOR ACADEMY (opened in April 2021) trains influencers such as video creators. Vantan has trained the next-generation of creators in a wide range of fields. Creators active at the forefront of their fields act as teachers for the curriculum, and have prepared from the secondary educational department which allows students to earn a high school diploma, to career colleges for working adults. Several academic-industrial projects are being implemented with an emphasis on the acquisition of practical skills.
In April 2024, KADOKAWA SCHOOL OF MANGA and KADOKAWA SCHOOL OF ANIME will open in Tokyo and Osaka. They specialize in the digital domains of cartoons and animations.
In addition to holding 16 classes on SDGs in FY2020, Vantan had a project with a major clothing brand in FY2021 where Vantan’s students proposed borderless fashion and exhibited collections not tied to gender, age, or nationality. In FY2022, Vantan operated GENKAI BURGER, a hamburger shop where students are involved in the entire process from designing menus to shop operation and devising measures to attract customers. GENKAI CAFE, an upmarket frappe shop, opened in the same year and uses Geisha coffee, the world’s highest ranked variety of coffee. The company is committed to social issues through educational activities and runs unique, practice-oriented classes.
