#GoingGlobal: VSU-Hiroshima University partnership expands to inter-university cooperation

The 15-year partnership between Visayas State University (VSU) and Hiroshima University (HU) has recently expanded to inter-university cooperation in a jointly signed agreement on academic and educational exchange between the two leading higher education institutions both of which rank 2nd in the Times Higher Education (THE) Sustainability Impact Ranking in their respective countries.

The signing was held between VSU President, Dr. Prose Ivy G. Yepes, and Hiroshima University President, Dr. Ochi Mitsuo, with Dr. Jade Dhapnee Z. Compendio, Director for VSU International Affairs and Relations, and Dr. Kaneko Shinji, HU Executive Vice President for Global Initiatives, as witnesses at Hiroshima University, Japan on August 6, 2026.

"I am so glad to announce that the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the two universities has been upgraded. So it's now upgraded into what we call an inter-university agreement, meaning to say, it's a university-level agreement now, as compared to the previous one, college-to-college," Dr. Lawrence Liao, coordinator of the Global Commons, Global Learning Center of Hiroshima University, said in an interview. 

He added that all academic and non-academic units of both institutions are now included in this agreement where both can learn best practices from each other.

The present agreement covers promotion of joint research, exchange of faculty members and administrative staff, exchange of undergraduate and graduate students, exchange of research outcomes, research publications, and other academic information, and other academic and educational exchange programs. 

A welcome development now in the works is the exchange between the VSU College of Medicine and the School of Medicine in Hiroshima University.

"President Yepes emphasized the fact that this upgrading of the MOU is very fortuitous because VSU just opened its College of Medicine. And our School of Medicine is, of course, very old already. But it's the leading School of Medicine in Japan. And President Yepes was so excited about the prospects of initiating exchanges between the two. So expect more exchanges witb Medicine," Dr. Liao revealed. 

"I'm very excited because aside from our long-standing cooperation between tbe two colleges of Agriculture, it will now go into Medicine. It will now go into Engineeting. It will now go into Arts and Literature and Economics and Law. And I look forward to many cooperation and, you know, upgrading, uplifting our own departments and colleges here in VSU," he stressed. 

The partnership of Hiroshima University and VSU began in 2011 between the then VSU College of Agriculture and Food Science (CAFS), now the Faculty of Agriculture and Food Science, and School of Applied Biological Science of Hiroshima University during the term of then University President, Dr. Jose L. Bacusmo.

In the same year, Hiroshima University sent its first batch of exchange students. This later developed into an annual event the most recent of which was concluded on August 12, 2026 in time for the ASEAN Mixer, one of the highlights of the ASEAN Month Celebration and is a custom adopted from Hiroshima University. 

The VSU-HU partnership further progressed during the administration of Dr. Bacusmo’s successor, former VSU President, Dr. Edgardo E. Tulin, where faculty and students were regularly sent to the International Summer School for Agricultural Science and receive “preferential treatment” when they took their masters or doctorate degrees as scholars in Hiroshima. 

In 2013, the Hiroshima University community raised funds to help reconstruct parts of VSU devastated by typhoon Haiyan, locally known as Yolanda. 

Hiroshima University also donated in 2015 journals and books to the VSU Library, with this collection now occupying a special corner of the University Learning Commons.

"Our relationship with Hiroshima University is one that VSU deeply appreciates. It has grown over many years through exchanges, academic engagements, and relationships between our peoplw. This new agreement gives that long-standing connection a renewed direction and creates more opportunities for our faculty and students to learn, engage, and work with their counterparts in Hiroshima," University President Prose Ivy G. Yepes said in a statement.

"We look forward to what our two universities can accomplish together in the years ahead," she added.

For its efforts to forge international academic cooperation, VSU granted Hiroshima University the Sandigan Bayan Award in 2024. 

This article aligns with United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) No. 4: Quality Education and SDG No. 17: Partnership for the Goals.

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