Mississippi State University students provided Japanese culture lessons at Millsaps Vocational Technical School in Starkville, from Mississippi Oct. 16 through today.  
JuYoung Lee, assistant professor in the School of Human Sciences, said the idea for the classes began when she had an idea to create activities for Japanese outreach, and she thought it would be a great idea to get students involved in actually teaching what they learned in the classes. 
“I  applied for a grant by the Japan Foundation Global Partnership to initiate Japan Outreach activities early this year and got awarded to have a Japan Outreach Coordinator for two years,” Lee said. “I thought it would be a good opportunity for us to have the coordinator to come to one of my classes to teach about Kimono wearing and Japanese culture. I also thought it would be a great opportunity for our students to teach about what they have learned to local K-12 students.”
 Lee said she believes the classes present a great opportunity to reach out to the local areas and become more open-minded about learning about other cultures.
“These classes are a great outreach activity of MSU to a local community, which is one of our principle goals of the institution as a land grant university,” she said. “We are very interested in creating new knowledge through research, but also in reaching out to our local community to introduce this new knowledge in order to fast forward the economic development of the state of Mississippi. By offering this type of classes to our community, MSU can help our local community become a community that is open to other cultures and countries for more foreign direct investment from not only Japan, but also any other countries.” 
Kathy Dawkins, marketing instructor at Millsaps Vocational Technical School, said the classes are important because it is crucial for students to learn about cultural differences in Japan. 
“We live in Starkville, home of MSU, a very culturally diverse university. It is critical that we know about traditions, cultures and customs from around the world,” Dawkins said. “My students may one day work for a corporation that does business with companies in Japan. They may have to travel to Japan to conduct business, and they need to know about their customs so they do not offend anyone in Japan.” 
Dawkins said she believes the classes form a great collaboration between MSU and the marketing class and helps students get excited about learning Japanese culture. 
“The classes provide a great partnership between the Japanese Cultural Center at MSU and my marketing classes at Millsaps Career and Technology Center,” she said. “It helps to whet the appetites of my students so they want to learn more about the Japanese way of life. They take their excitement home and tell others about what they are learning and then their parents, siblings, neighbors, friends, etc. want to learn more about it also.”
April Heiselt, director for the Center for the Advancement of Service-Learning Excellence (CASLE), said CASLE partners with various people to create opportunities for learning through service. 
“We are a partnership between the extension service, the office of the provost, academic affairs and the executive vice president,” Heiselt said. “I act as a bridge builder and partner either faculty with community partners, community partners with faculty or extension agents with faculty to produce a service learning opportunity. That might be in a curricular or co-curricular venue and that has to do with the classes.” 
Heiselt said students who take the classes will learn about attire in the Japanese culture. 
“Students learn (for example) why do you wear what you wear? Why do you wear certain things at certain times? How does that play a role?” Heiselt said. 
Heiselt said she believes it is significant for Americans to be able to understand cultural differences. 
“It’s important that we as Americans understand when we’re working with someone from another culture about the things that we should be doing, how the way we dress compares and what we should be prepared for,” Heiselt said. 
According to Heiselt, students went to Millsaps Vocational Technical School and presented what they learned in the classes. 
“Students have prepared presentations based on the material they have learned,” she said. “We partnered them with Millsaps so they have an opportunity to meet their students and talk about the importance of clothing and making these proper choices as these high school students are getting prepared to think about their future careers.” 
Heiselt said it is essential to students who do community service to not only serve the community, but to do service that is academically relevant to students. 
“It’s important because it’s not just that our students are doing community service, but we get a chance to do meaningful community service tied to academic core subjective,” Heiselt said. 
Heiselt said she believes and has proof that students who take these classes are better leaders and better communicators. “What a difference it means to students that not only they get that chance to have a real life client, but we’ve seen and have research that shows that students get to work with people who are not like themselves, which shows leadership skills and better communication,” Heiselt said.