Welcome to Seiro Middle School
The Prefecture's First Subject Centred System
Seiro Town, Niigata Prefecture, Japan

 
In March 1955, Seiro Village and Kameshiro Village joined together to form Seiro Town. From that time, it was a long outstanding promise to the townspeople that the two junior high schools, Seiro J.H.S. and Kameshiro J.H.S., would be merged. Gradually, in March 2001, the two schools closed, and in April a new Seiro Middle School was built, and with it, a new school system began.

The design to the left is the school crest, created by Hisao Kouyama, one of the school designers. The motifs were the nature of raising and supporting its people, the big skies, and the ocean. The first layer represents the sun; the second layer represents the Niigata plains, and the wide, abundant winds that blow against it; and the bottom layer expresses the sea. The three colours of the plains layer represent the changes in colour of the rice paddies during the year.

As for the school's feature characteristics, there is a subject center system and a computer system, which were both built into the archetecture of the school from the beginning. It was also designed to be a school open to the region.
 

Subject Center System  
Although the students from each grade level belong to a class like in a typical Japanese school, there is no classroom for each class. This feature is not typical of a Japanese school, where each class has its own classroom. Instead, there is a homebase which has a different function than the classroom. For attending students, it's a homebase for private-use lockers, chairs, and the focal point of their student life. They can also use the homebase's computers, confirm their daily schedule, and from there go to the day's classes.
 
 There are classrooms in the new school, but they are designed for the exclusive use for a particular school subject. In other words, each school subject has dedicated classrooms. When it comes time for students to have a class in a particular subject, they take their books and school materials to the subject's classroom. Each subject has a "zone" or center in the school, a wide-open "open space" with computers, and a library of books based on that particular subject.
A School Open to the Region  
In a corner of the school, there is a regional cultural exchange area. It's an area used by the area's PTA volunteer support group (called "Mirai-no-tane") and other people in the region. It has its own entrance and a "homebase" for the townspeople. The region's volunteers and other people manage this zone on their own. People from the region can visit the classrooms at their leisure, and from time to time help out in the classrooms.