Sophia University


Sophia University, is considered one of the top private research universities in Japan. According to the Times Higher Education, Sophia has the 20th place in its 2020 Japan University Rankings and is the top 4th private university in the country. Founded by the Roman Catholic religious order of the Society of Jesus in 1913, the University has grown from its 3 original academic departments of Philosophy, German Literature, and Commerce to 9 undergraduate Faculties and 10 Graduate Schools, with over 13,900 students in total.
Ever since Sophia was established, the University has been a leader in the internationalisation of Japanese universities. It had been conducting classes both in English and Japanese, and welcoming students from abroad from China, Korea, and even from Europe. Soon afterward, Sophia gained national repute as the leading institution in globalisation, foreign languages, and literature in Japan. As a prominent institution for research and higher learning in the fields of the social sciences, humanities, and natural sciences, the University has been selected by the Japanese Ministry of Education to be one of 37 universities to receive funding for its internationalisation efforts through the "Top Global University Project".
Today, Sophia has international students from 77 countries. It also has forged agreements with 298 overseas universities in 59 countries. It also possesses student exchange programs with several other top universities throughout the world, including Georgetown University, Yale University, The University of Georgia, Sogang University, Hong Kong University, and the University of Cologne. Before 1957, the university only admitted male students to degree programs, but the numbers of male and female students are now more or less equal. Sophia’s alumni are referred to as "Sophians"; they include the 79th Prime Minister of Japan, Morihiro Hosokawa, several politicians represented in the National Diet of Japan, and professors at various institutions.

Origins of the University Name

The name of the University is traced to letters of correspondence between two of the three founders of what would become Sophia University, Fr. James Rockliff, SJ and Fr. Hermann Hoffmann, SJ. The Japanese term 上智 was the equivalent of the Latin word sapientia, which means wisdom. According to Catholic Church tradition, the term sapientia refers to the one of the Church's devotional titles for the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Seat of Wisdom.
When Joseph Eylenbosch, SJ began teaching Greek at the University on April 1924, he taught that the Japanese term jōchi was the equivalent of the Greek term σοφία. Afterwords, the students had proposed that the school be known as Sophia University.
Fr. Hoffmann, SJ, who was serving as University President at that time, initially opposed the proposal. However, he soon accepted the idea and submitted the proposal to Rome for the approval.
The English language-based, peer-reviewed academic journal Monumenta Nipponica, which was first inaugurated in 1938, identified itself as being published by Sophia University. The use of Sophia as the University name then became firmly established in Japan and overseas.

History of the University

Early History

The origins of Sophia University could be traced to 1549 when Saint Francis Xavier, a prominent member and co-founder of the Society of Jesus, arrived in Japan to spread Christianity. In his letters to his fellow Jesuits, he had expressed hopes of establishing a university in Japan.
During the so-called Kirishitan period of Japanese history, the Catholic Church had been responsible for establishing and administering educational institutions in Japan called Collegios and Seminarios, serving as bridges between the East and West.
The establishment of the University only began to take place more than 400 years from St. Francis Xavier's arrival in Japan. In 1903, three Jesuit priests from Europe came to Japan to continue the missionary work of the Church and to help establish Sophia University. One of the founders, Fr. Joseph Dahlmann, SJ from Germany, who had come to Japan via India, had listened to the requests of Catholics in the country, who expressed their desires to construct a Catholic university to serve as the cultural and spiritual base of the Church's missionary operations in Japan.
Fr. Dahlmann heeded the requests and sent a proposal to the then-Bishop of Rome, Pope Pius X, at the Holy See in Rome.
Dahlmann was then granted a private audience with the Pope in 1905 regarding the request. The Pius X promised to assign the Society of Jesus to create and administer a Catholic university in Japan. In Dahlmann's Latin memoirs regarding the encounter with the His Holiness, he recounted that the Pope spoke as follows: "Habebitis collegium in Japonica, magnam universitatem.
On that same year, the then-Bishop of Portland, Maine in the United States, William H. O'Connell, was appointed by the Pope to serve as a special ambassador of the Vatican to Emperor Meiji in Japan. O'Connell was also tasked to survey the situation in Japan. When he was granted an audience with Emperor Meiji, he had ascertained the education policy directions of the Japanese Education Ministry, and reported to officials at the Holy See regarding the possible establishment of a Catholic university in Japan.
At the 25th General Congregation of the Society of Jesus in held in Rome on September 1906, Pius X issued a formal written statement to the Jesuits to establish a Catholic university in Japan. Thus, the delegates at the Congregation voted unanimously in favour of the Pope's commands, and the first concrete steps were taken to prepare a university institution in the East.

History of the University After Its Establishment

Sophia University was founded by Jesuits in 1913. It opened with departments of German Literature, Philosophy and Commerce, headed by its founder Fr. Hermann Hoffmann, SJ as its first official president.
In 1932, a small group of Sophia University students refused to salute the war dead at Yasukuni Shrine in the presence of a Japanese military attache, saying it violated their religious beliefs. The military attache was withdrawn from Sophia as a result of this incident, damaging the university's reputation in the eyes of the government of the Japanese Empire. The Archbishop of Tokyo intervened in the standoff by permitting Catholic students to salute the war dead, after which many Sophia students, as well as Hermann Hoffmann himself, participated in rites at Yasukuni. The Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples later issued the Pluries Instanterque in 1936, which encouraged Catholics to attend Shinto shrines as a patriotic gesture; the Vatican re-issued this document after the war in 1951.
Sophia University continued to grow by increasing the numbers of departments, faculty members and students, in addition to advancing its international focus by establishing an exchange program. Many of its students studied at Georgetown University in the United States as early as 1935. Sophia's junior college was established in 1973, followed by the opening of Sophia Community College in 1976. With the founding of the Faculty of Liberal Arts in 2006, Sophia University presently holds 27 departments in its eight faculties. Its current president is Yoshiaki Terumichi. Toshiaki Koso serves as head of its board of directors. Since 2008, the Global Leadership Program was started for students from four Jesuit universities in East Asia: Ateneo de Manila University in the Philippines, Fu Jen Catholic University in Taiwan, Sogang University in South Korea, and Sophia University in Japan. In 2016 the University reached out to the four Jesuit junior-senior high schools in Japan, joining them in the Sophia College Corporation to help them pass on the Jesuit charism to their lay faculty through workshops and other assistance. These schools are Sophia-Fukuoka, Eiko Gakuen, Hiroshima Gakuin, and Rokko School.
Sophia's Research Institutes Division includes 11 research institutes with about 200 researchers.

Campuses

Sophia's main campus at Yotsuya is urban, consisting of roughly 25 large, modern buildings in the center of Tokyo. The majority of Sophia's 10,000 undergraduate students spend nearly all their time here. The faculties of Humanities, Law, Foreign Studies, Economics, Liberal Arts, and Science and Technology have their home here, as do the main library, cafeteria, gymnasium, chapel, bookstore, and offices. In April 2006, the Faculty of Comparative Culture, which had been located at the smaller Ichigaya campus, moved to the main Yotsuya campus and changed its name to the Faculty of Liberal Arts. Nearly all of Sophia's foreign exchange and international students study at the FLA.
The Tokyo office of the Council on International Educational Exchange, the student exchange organisation, which oversees roughly half of the international students, is also based on the main Yotsuya Campus. The Shakujii campus houses the Faculty of Theology. The Hadano campus in Kanagawa Prefecture is home to the Sophia Junior College, as well as a number of seminar halls and athletics complexes.

Sophia School Corporation

Established in 1911, the Sophia School Corporation provides administrative support to academic institutions in its higher education division and secondary school education division, managing a total of 7 schools. In 1951, the Sophia School Corporation was then established as an academic legal entity according to provisions of the Private School Law.
Higher Education InstitutionsSecondary Education Institutions
Sophia UniversityEiko Gakuen Junior and Senior High School
Sophia School of Social WelfareRokko Junior and Senior High School
Sophia University Junior College DivisionHiroshima Gakuin Junior and Senior High School
Sophia-Fukuoka Junior and Senior High School

Academics

The University has 9 undergraduate faculties with 29 departments as well as 10 graduate schools with 25 programmes. With over 14,021 students as of 2017, the University provides academic opportunities for students from Japan and overseas to study in Japan. Sophia also possesses a wide-variety of English-taught academic programmes such as those provided by the Faculty of Liberal Arts. English programmes are also provided by the Faculty of Science and Technology through two programmes and the Green Science Programme, provided by the Department of Materials and Life Sciences, and the Green Engineering Programme, provided by the Department of Engineering and Applied Sciences.
Faculty of TheologyFaculty of HumanitiesFaculty of Human SciencesFaculty of LawFaculty of EconomicsFaculty of Foreign StudiesFaculty of Global StudiesFaculty of Science and TechnologyFaculty of Liberal Arts
Department of TheologyDepartment of PhilosophyDepartment of EducationDepartment of LawDepartment of EconomicsDepartment of English StudiesDepartment of Global StudiesDepartment of Materials and Life SciencesDepartment of Liberal Arts
Department of HistoryDepartment of PsychologyDepartment of International Legal StudiesDepartment of ManagementDepartment of German StudiesDepartment of Engineering and Applied Sciences
Department of Japanese LiteratureDepartment of SociologyDepartment of Legal Studies of the Global EnvironmentDepartment of French StudiesDepartment of Information and Communication Sciences
Department of English LiteratureDepartment of Social ServicesDepartment of Hispanic Studies
Department of German LiteratureDepartment of NursingDepartment of Russian Studies
Department of French LiteratureDepartment of Luso-Brazilian Studies
Department of Journalism

University Academic Research

Sophia University is a comprehensive research university with 9 undergraduate faculties with 10 graduate schools located on a single campus in Chiyoda, Tokyo. Leading higher education institutions in Japan toward globalisation and academic research, the University provides a strong international network of scholarship, attracting researchers and students from overseas to study in Japan.
As a research institution, the University established the Sophia Research Organisation on April 2005 in order to promote and facilitate interdisciplinary and organisational research activities. The SRO possesses two research divisions: the Research Institutes Division and the Project Research Division. The University also has affiliated Research Organisations.
Simultaneously, Sophia's Centre for Research Promotion and Support provides additional support to general research activities and strengthens the a three-way collaboration initiative among industries, government, and academia. The Intellectual Property Rights Committee, established in 2005, ensures smooth collaborative support among the three individual groups and examines the inventions and intellectual properties of the researchers affiliated with Sophia University.
Academic Research SupportResearch Institutes DivisionProject Research DivisionAffiliated Research Organisations
Sophia Research OrganisationInstitute for Christian CultureNanotechnology Research CentreKirishitan Bunko Library
Centre for Research Promotion and SupportInstitute for Medieval ThoughtCentre for Islamic StudiesMonumenta Nipponica
Intellectual Property Rights CommitteeIberoamerican InstituteSustainable Energy Research CentreSophia Asia Centre for Research and Human Development
Sophia Science and Technology Liaison Office Linguistic Institute for International CommunicationResearch and Development Centre for CAE Technologies Applied for Next-Generation Transport Aircraft DesignInstitute for Grief Care
Institute of Global ConcernMicrowave Science Research CentreSemiconductor Research Institute
Institute of Comparative CultureWater-Scarce Society Information and Research CentreSophia University Institute of Bioethics
European InstituteSophia Institute for Human SecurityHuman Resource Centre for International Cooperation
Institute of Asian, African, and Middle Eastern
Studies		Institute of International Relations
Institute of American and Canadian Studies
Institute of Media, Culture, and Journalism
Institute for Studies of the Global Environment


Academic rankings

There are several rankings below related to Sophia University.

Alumni rankings

Alumni of Sophia have good employment prospects in Japanese industries. According to the :ja:エコノミスト |Weekly Economist's 2010 rankings and the :ja:プレジデント社|PRESIDENT's article on 2006/10/16, graduates from Sophia have the 8th best employment rate in 400 major companies, and the average graduate salary is the 6th best in Japan.

Popularity and selectivity

Admission to Sophia is highly selective and competitive in Japan. As such it is considered as one of the top private universities along with Keio University and Waseda University. Typical acceptance rate is 5%. Its entrance difficulty is considered one of the toughest along with Waseda and Keio among 730 private universities.

Overseas Partner Institutions

Sophia University has student and academic exchange agreements with 374 overseas partner universities in 77 countries as of April 2020.

Notable faculty

Government, politics, and society