【The 57th JAIF Annual Conference】“Strengthening the Human Resources Base in the Nuclear Industry”

Four panelists, listed below, gave presentations:

• Grace STANKE, nuclear fuels engineer and clean energy advocate at Constellation. An advocate for nuclear energy, she was crowned Miss America 2023 last year.
• WAKABAYASHI Genichiro, professor at the Atomic Energy Research Institute of Kindai University.
• MAKINO Momoe, senior research fellow at the Development Studies Center of the Institute of Developing Economies, Japan External Trade Organization (IDE-JETRO).
• Kristine MADDEN, nuclear evaluator and safeguards inspector at the Office of the Deputy Director General and Head of the Department of Safeguards, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), and president of the International Youth Nuclear Congress (IYNC).

They were then joined by three students for a panel discussion, as follows:

• NISHIDA Momono, senior at Fukui Minami High School.
• TAKAHASHI Nanami, 5th-year student at the Department of Mechanical System Engineering of the National Institute of Technology, Fukushima College.
• FUNASAKA Yuzuka, senior in the Department of Physics at the School of Advanced Science and Engineering in Waseda University.

The panel discussion was moderated by Professor ARAI Tsuyoshi, who works at the Program of Chemistry and Material at the College of Engineering of the Shibaura Institute of Technology. He opened with a presentation entitled “Turning the nuclear industry into an area of strong appeal to students.” Specifically, he said that the image that nuclear careers are for men needed to be dispelled. Instead, he emphasized, the industry should be made more attractive to women and gender diversity increased. He urged consideration of innovative approaches calling attention to the nuclear industry.

Constellation’s Stanke spoke next, her presentation entitled “The Role of Youth and Mentorship in Nuclear.” She talked about her background and how she became interested in nuclear engineering, then shared her thoughts on being an intermediary between the younger generation and the nuclear industry. The nuclear industry, she said, needs more than just engineers, but also the involvement of various people, including communicators. Given its importance, Stanke explained that she had gradually become interested in activities that make the nuclear industry better and more universally known among young people.

Prof. Wakabayashi of Kindai University, the next speaker, reported on education in secondary schools under the theme of “Nuclear Human Resource Development using the Kindai University Reactor.” Reactor experiments and training workshops have already been staged five times at the Kindai research reactor for students in junior and senior high school. Each time, more students have applied than the 16 spaces available, and more than half of the applicants have been female.

The reality in Japan, however, is that, when the time comes for high school students to take university entrance examinations, the number of female students seeking to major in nuclear engineering is quite low. Interested in resolving that gender gap, Wakabayashi said that the key was to show everyone demonstrating an interest in nuclear power the prospect of good jobs and a rewarding future, based on higher education.

He was followed by IDE-JETRO’s Makino, who specializes in empirical research in microeconomics. In her presentation, she explained that incomes for those working in STEM fields in Europe are quite high, and that half of the seemingly large income disparity between men and women can be explained by the latter not majoring in STEM subjects. Gender disparities are greatly affected by assumptions.

Finally, Madden of IAEA and IYNC introduced activities by her two organizations that are aimed at young people and women. The IYNC in particular, she said, is engaged in developing and fostering the professional abilities of young people. It cooperates with the European Nuclear Society (ENS) and others to reflect the voices of the younger generation in climate change discussions.

At that point, the three student panelists joined the four adults and a panel discussion ensued, with Arai as facilitator. The panelists’ comments were focused on generation and gender.

High school student panelist Nishida pointed out that many areas within the industry that can be approached from a humanities background, such as public relations.

Takahashi, the 5th year college student, recounted experiencing the giant  earthquake of March 2011, adding that she had gone through typhoons and other disasters as well. She also mentioned that when she was in junior high, she had the opportunity to discuss the nuclear power plants in Fukushima with students in Nagasaki. Having begun with the stereotype that nuclear power was dangerous, she realized after meeting the Nagasaki students that she really didn’t know anything about it after all, so she began to increase her knowledge.

University senior Funasaka said, “Having lived overseas for a long time, I had many opportunities to think about racial issues and diversity.” Nuclear issues, she said, presented an opportunity to think about the connections among society, science, and technology. “I chose the field of nuclear energy,” she stated confidently, “because it matched my interests in aerospace applications for accelerators, and in radiation uses.”

Stanke, who herself recently made the decision to join the nuclear industry, said that she was incredibly optimistic about the industry, mentioning the commercial operation of the first new reactor in the United States in 35 years and the launch of another this year, and technology development such as small module reactors (SMRs). She emphasized that the nuclear industry not only needed professional specialists in nuclear engineering but also people from many other fields.

Madden then noted the younger generation’s keen interest in climate change issues and stressed that she wanted to have the opportunity to discuss with young people how nuclear energy greatly contributes to net-zero carbon emissions. She also explained the development of a human-resources matching tool to allow people to explore possibilities in the nuclear industry, as well as an IAEA podcast to convey the working environment at the IAEA.

When students are presented with role models with which they can identify, Wakabayashi noted, the number of those seeking jobs in the nuclear industry steadily increases. He regularly invites graduates of his university now in the nuclear industry back to his research institute to share their experiences with current students, who are then better able to envision realistic futures for themselves. If students see how their own studies will be useful for society, some of them will be inspired to enter the field of nuclear energy.