Professor Rihito Yaegashi has led pioneering initiatives as Director of the DX Research Center at the Integrated Center for Informatics of Kagawa University. With “in-house system development technologies” based on low-code/no-code tools as a core, he has advanced an integrated approach to both cultivating digital transformation (DX) professionals and transforming university operations. His initiatives are particularly distinguished by their ability to connect education with practical implementation.

While the Information-technology Promotion Agency (IPA), in its DX Trends 2024, identifies in-house system development as a key technology required for DX promotion, Professor. Yaegashi has been systematically promoting in-house development since 2021. As of March 2026, more than 150 operational systems have been developed and are in active use within the university. A representative example, the lost-and-found management system “KadaMikke,” has been deployed not only at Kagawa University but also at OsakaKyoiku University, Shimane University, and other institutions, where it has become firmly established as a framework enabling each organization to operate the system autonomously. In addition, the solution catalog website that publishes Kagawa University’s in-house systems has recorded over 130,000 accesses and more than 3,700 downloads, thereby promoting the sharing of knowledge and horizontal dissemination.

In the area of education, he developed the “In-house Development / Hands-on Data Analysis Program,” through which participants learn via system development and data analysis and visualization. The program achieves a low barrier to entry, allowing participation by individuals with only basic work experience equivalent to using Word and Excel. This hands-on program has responded not only to internal university needs but also to requests from other universities, companies, and local governments; to date, it has been offered 64 times, with a total of 2,804 participants. As a result, at Kagawa University, non-IT staff members have grown to the point of developing 285 operational systems in-house, including campus access application systems and inquiry chatbots, thereby presenting a concrete DX promotion model for higher education institutions. Furthermore, these practices have been systematized as electronic textbooks, Introduction to In-house Development of Business Systems and Advanced In-house Development of Business Systems, and returned to society as reproducible educational resources.

Professor Yaegashi has taken a leading role in driving these initiatives and has delivered approximately 100 invited lectures, including presentations for CIOs at the Academic eXchange for Information Environment and Strategy（AXIES）. Through contributions to academic journals and public relations magazines, as well as media coverage, he has widely disseminated these advanced practices. At a time when the shortage of IT professionals has become a serious societal challenge, his efforts have had significant ripple effects by continuously cultivating DX personnel who can effectively contribute in real-world settings.

For these reasons, I am firmly convinced that Professor Yaegashi’s achievements are fully deserving of the Society’s Education Excellence Award, and I hereby offer my strongest recommendation.