The 21st Century is the era of significant changes, as the world economy may instantly fall into recession. Also, it is an unforeseeable era, in which a stable profession today may disappear in ten years with rapid development of technologies, such as AI or robots. In order to survive through this world, one needs to have not only expertise in one field, but also possess expertise in several areas. Also, one needs to acquire work-related general skills, such as “defining problems,“ “creative thinking,” “interpersonal skills” and “leadership”, so that one can perform well no matter what profession he/she may have. Based on the motto of SIT Founder, “Nurturing engineers who learn from society and contribute to society,” the PAES Department provides multiple specialized fields, such as Architecture Field (architectural design, structural engineering, construction management, etc.) and Urban and Regional Planning Field (land use planning, environmental design, disaster risk management, etc.) as well as Environmental Systems (energy/ resource/ international development engineering and management) that encompasses the two main fields above. Having this expertise as a warp thread, and the systems engineering program in the College as a weft thread, we provide the education that enables students to combine these skills as though to weave delicate fabric.

In human resource development that aims to improve one’s performance in social and institutional activities, I, T and π shapes are metaphorically used to represent the way a person possesses knowledge, technology and abilities. An I-shaped person represents a specialist who has deep expertise and experiences in a single field. A person with T-shaped skills possesses not only expertise in a single field but also a proficiency in other broad areas. Horizontal bar represents the width of scope, while vertical bar means the depth of professional skills. A π-shaped skilled person possesses expertise in more than two specialized fields. In the PAES Department, the horizontal bar in π represents the interdisciplinary problem-solving skill (s: Systems Thinking) through the interactive design collaboration (D: Design Thinking). One of the vertical bars is the main expertise in environmental design technology (G: Green Infrastructure Engineering) which makes cities more sustainable, while the other vertical bar represents sub-expertise which supports the main expertise in the society. Through nurturing motivation to contribute to the solutions for the social and local problems (S: Service Learning) in π-shaped skill, PAES produces the creative professionals who readily respond to diverse social needs.