Our Mission Statement

GOALS and OBJECTIVES

1. Teaching basic and applied pharmaceutical sciences and technology
2. Training in the skills necessary to properly accomplish the social mission of pharmaceutical sciences
3. Contributing to social development through research on pharmaceutical sciences

The general purpose of pharmaceutical education in Japan is not only to train pharmacists in the administration of medical treatment but also to instill in researchers and technologists a broad knowledge of the fields relevant to pharmaceutical science. The Pharmaceutical curricula thus include various fields of life science and many schools and institutes have opted for the title “pharmaceutical sciences” over the more traditional “school of pharmacy” to reflect this broad-based approach. Practically the Okayama University faculty members carry out the above objectives, as shown in the Lectures & Practices, and graduating students find employment in a variety of locations: pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, diagnostic laboratories, public research institutions, educational institutions etc. In addition to completing lectures and practices, undergraduate are obliged to complete a senior thesis during their fourth and final school year. Each student is given a research topic. Outstanding theses are published in scientific journals pertinent to the specific field. More than half of the graduating students enter the graduate school’s master’s degree program (2 years), and some of them go on to the doctoral program (3 years) after the receiving master’s degree. The master’s program is administered along with the undergraduate program in the Graduate School of Natural Science and Technology of Okayama University (GSNST-OU), but the doctoral program under GSNST-OU is an independent unit cooperatively managed by five natural science faculties : Science, Pharmaceutical Sciences, Engineering, Environmental Science & Technology and Agriculture. GSNST-OU is composed of the following six interdisciplinary and comprehensive divisions: Science & Technology for Materials, Science for Engineering & Agricultural Technology, Bioresource Science, Biopharmaceutical Science, System Science and Science & Technology for Intelligence. All staff of the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences belong to the Division of Biopharmaceutical Science. Organization of other graduate schools and institutes of Okayama University is shown in the appendix.