Aspiring to the World where Everyone Has a Decent Place to Live
Leading "Habitat for Humanity Sophia"

Habitat for Humanity, or HFH, is a US-based international NGO that has expanded to 80 countries worldwide, developing programs to deal with the problems of housing for the poor and to support disaster recovery toward the goal of a "world where everyone has a decent place to live." I have been engaged in such activities since visiting Mongolia on an HFH program in my second year of high school.

While thinking about how I can continue my involvement with HFH even after entering university, I found out about HFH's youth program for college students. So, in March 2011, I launched the HFH Sophia Campus Chapter with five of my friends. The way the HFH youth program works is that first of all, an unauthorized HFH club conducts activities and builds up a track record, until eventually it is recognized as an official "campus chapter," an authorized student branch of HFH Japan. The title of "campus chapter" is only granted to student groups whose activity achievements are highly acclaimed even among the various HFH student branches scattered around the world, and so we too got engaged in activities in order to gain such recognition.

We conduct three main activities. One is called Global Village (GV), an overseas housing support program in which participants visit underdeveloped areas of developing countries and support the resident communities by helping to construct houses. Last year we went to Malaysia where, during our stay, we built a home in cooperation with other volunteers from around the world. This summer, we are taking part in a partner project in the Philippines with other university groups from the host country as well as Japan and the US. HFH Japan branches look to us for leadership, so all of our members want to make absolutely sure we tackle this activity to the best of our abilities. Another one of our activities is volunteering in the area devastated by the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake. This includes supporting the recovery of the region through various projects such as helping to construct shelters, etc. We also conduct activities in Tokyo such as cleaning the streets, organizing fundraisers, and supporting the homeless with other NGOs.

Highly rated for all our efforts since our launch three years ago, HFH Sophia received official recognition as a campus chapter on July 2014. We have also been praised for our leading role in collaborative projects with overseas groups, as our members, many of whom are overseas students or Japanese returnees from abroad, conduct nearly all our activities in English. I feel a sense of fulfillment in this official recognition and the fact that we have finally reached this point three years after our launch. Since the beginning when we were only five people, we have expanded HFH Sophia's activities and are now fortunate enough to have 25 members. Although I will retire as its leader, I will not forget the principles of HFH and its goal of a "world where everyone has a safe and decent place to live," and intend to remain actively involved in its activities in the future.