On Saturday, October 26th and Sunday, October 27th, the first used school bag donation event of the year, "Randoseru Land," was held at the "Environmental Festival Fukuoka 2024" held in front of Fukuoka City Hall. Over the two days, 104 school bags were donated and 146 new school bags were received.
The event, where participants can take home their school bags after participating in the games, is jointly planned and organized by Kyushu Sangyo University, Zokei Junior College of Art and Design and the NPO "Power of the Next Generation FUKUOKA" (Chuo-ku, Fukuoka City), and this year marks the third year of the initiative.
Visitors were able to choose their favorite school bag from the ones on display, put the backpack on and take part in a school commute experience game or participate in a craft workshop booth run by a sponsoring company. Those who wanted to receive the school bag were able to assemble an original presentation box together with the students, put the backpack inside and take it home.
Children were seen choosing one from the school bags, each with its own unique color and decoration, and talking to their parents, saying things like, "I like this color!" and "This mark is cute!" Parents expressed their desire to nurture a sense of caring for things, saying things like, "I participated because I wanted my child to feel closer to the SDGs," and "I want them to take good care of this school bag because it's the one they chose." In addition, people who came to donate after seeing the news said things like, "I saw the children on the TV news looking happy as they brought their school bags home, and I thought I wanted to donate if they could make them this happy," and some even came from as far away as Nagasaki to donate.
Watanabe Konatsu (Kasai High School), a first-year student in the Junior Department of Art and Design said, "I was in charge of explaining the rules to the children first. I made eye contact with the children and changed the speed at which I spoke depending on who I was talking to, so that even small children could understand. It was very impressive to see the smiles on the children's faces as they went home, carefully clutching their school bags in decorative boxes. Based on this experience, I would like to keep in mind 'designs that are useful to people' in my future projects and productions."
This initiative began with inter-university collaboration with neighboring universities last year. This year, with the cooperation of Kurume University, Fukuoka Women's University, and Nakamura Gakuen University, the event will be held in Kurume City in December and in Kitakyushu City in January.
*For details on upcoming events, click here
[Kyushu Sangyo University, Zokei Junior College of Art and Design]
