Abstract:

One of the major goals of community development is to realize how to make the lives of local residents more comfortable and safer, and how to revitalize and improve the attractiveness of the community. In recent years, Japan has experienced unprecedented social conditions, such as a declining birthrate, an aging population, and frequent disasters. Under these circumstances, how will the discussion opportunities change the way we think about and work on community development? It is necessary to involve many actors, including young people, in community development and policy formulation. Under these circumstances, workshops are being conducted as a method to address the community, identify local issues, and solve problems.

The purpose of this study is to identify the informational and educational effects on community development. We will understand how people's awareness and interest in community development changes at each stage of providing information, gathering information, and conducting discussions, as well as how participants' interest and effectiveness in community development changes as a result of the opportunity for community development discussions.

Based on our previous studies, “Output” and “Outcome” are defined as follows. Output is a result through a project execution. On the other hand, Outcome is a consequence and achievements made on a project and they are also aware of something from a process of a project and output. Output of this study is a plan of sustainable urban development. Outcome is learners’ realization and becoming a human resource which person that people who can contribute to society.

In considering town planning, learners experience the following learning process through discussion-based learning:
1. learning about national and regional planning,
2. individual learning and information gathering about town planning,
3. theme-based discussion,
4. summary of discussion and presentation,
5. self-confirmation of future approach to community development.

In each of these stages, differences in understanding, thinking, and interest in community development were analyzed and evaluated from the perspective of a questionnaire and rubric regarding their ideas and efforts, and from the perspective of a coordinator's evaluation based on the content of their discussion efforts. In this study, local university students experienced each stage of the learning process. At this time, they had many realizations and showed changes in their attitudes toward community development. It became clear once again that discussions and prior learning opportunities are effective in arousing interest in and changing attitudes toward community development, and that creating opportunities for learning has a significant impact on learners' willingness to learn. From the viewpoint of developing human resources involved in city planning, it is necessary to provide opportunities to engage in discussions, workshops, and other activities from various perspectives.

Keywords:

Experimental learning, Urban planning, Sightseeing, Disaster prevention, Migration.