Welcome to Teikyo University’s home in Durham
Established in 1990, Teikyo University of Japan in Durham (TUID) is an active branch campus of the Teikyo University Group in Japan, and it has been playing a key role in embodying the University’s three educational policies: Practical Learning, Developing International Perspectives and Nurturing Open-Mindedness.
In April and September, each year, we have a group of about thirty Japanese students from Teikyo University in Tokyo here on this campus. They come to Durham to improve their communication skills in English by taking English classes and also to strengthen mutual understanding and friendship with Durham University students and local people by interacting with them. By joining our study-abroad programme, they are seriously able to embody the university’s educational policies.
We have three buildings on the campus of Durham University. One is a University Lecture Building where Teikyo University students from Japan study mainly English, and the other two are Halls of Residence where our students and Durham University students live.
Our main building, called “Lafcadio Hearn Cultural Centre,” is named after a Greek-born Irish writer Lafcadio Hearn (1850 – 1904), who spent his teens (13 – 17 years old) studying at Ushaw College in Durham. He then went to America and became a journalist working for several newspaper companies. In 1890, he went to Japan and became an English teacher in Matsue and in Kumamoto and later became a Professor of English Literature at the-then Tokyo Imperial University (today’s Tokyo University). He was a prolific writer of books about Japanese folk tales and English Literature. Since he acted as a powerful ‘literary bridge’ between Japan and the Western world, our University found it very appropriate to title the building in his name.
I do hope that having Teikyo University here in Durham is meaningful both for Japanese students and for Durham University and its students, as well as local people.
Equality & Diversity Statement
Teikyo University of Japan in Durham strives to treat all its members and visitors fairly and aims to eliminate unjustifiable discrimination on the grounds of age, disability, gender re-assignment, race, nationality, ethnic or national heritage, political beliefs or practices, marital status, family circumstances, sex, sexual orientation, maternity and pregnancy, spent criminal convictions, or any other inappropriate grounds
Latest News
We have welcomed our new Principal, Prof Okabe this month. Please see Principal’s Greeting at the bottom of this page.
Just uploaded Michael’s new blog post about our short course programmes in Feb and March.
We were introduced by Newcastle Chronical News, and finally got permission to upload the article here. Please enjoy!
Extra-curricular Language Courses at The Centre for Foreign Language Study of Durham University | Registration Now Open for Autumn 2024/25 Programme Click on the Sway link to explore your options and start planning your language learning journey for 2024-25!
Japanese Class will not run this year. If you are interested in having a Cultural/Language Exchange Partner, we will still run this small programme. We have a very limited number of places and it will be first come first served basis. Please email Helen for more information: [email protected]
Online Programme - during 2025, for our Online Conversation Exchange via Zoom - open to Durham University students only. This is a twice monthly informal chat in English to our students in Japan about UK life and Durham. Next programme will start in April. If you are interested, please email Helen.[email protected]
＜Scholarship Programme> Teikyo University provides scholarship programmes for international students. Please click here for more information.
Photo Gallery
View our photo gallery » We added some photos of our students' activities in the UK.
Principal′s Greeting
“Students are the Protagonists.” .jpg)
I am Yukinori Okabe, the Principal of Teikyo University of Japan in Durham from April 2025.
I graduated from the Faculty of Law at Teikyo University in 1990, the same year as this Durham campus was established. I was unable to come to Durham as a student, but I am very happy to be here now as the Principal. After graduating from the under-graduate school of Law, I worked in a company until 1997, and then went on to study at a Post-graduate school of Management at the age of 30. I received a Master's degree in Business Administration in 1999 and a PhD in 2002, and after that I worked as a part-time and full-time lecturer at several universities. Finally, since 2019 I have been a professor at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at Teikyo Heisei University, and since 2025 I have also been a professor in the Department of Business Administration at the Faculty of Economics at Teikyo University.
In fact, “this is the first time a Teikyo University graduate has been appointed as the Principal of Durham campus”.
“It is also the first time that a professor from Teikyo Heisei University has been appointed as the Principal of Durham campus.”
In addition, I am the youngest (closest to your age?) Principal of Durham campus to date.
In other words, I am an “alumni” for everyone in the Teikyo University Group, and for the students of Teikyo Heisei University, I am “a professor from your own university”. For me, you are “fellow students, who I feel special admiration towards”.
I am incredibly happy to be able to experience this new life with you in Durham.
At the Teikyo University of Japan in Durham, there is an environment that will help students to develop the skills they need to play an active role in Japan and overseas. By actually using the four skills of English (speaking, listening, writing, reading) that you have cultivated in Japan since elementary and junior high school here in the mother country of English, the UK, the accumulated power of your “knowledge of English as a foreign language” will bear fruit, and you will evolve into “using and learning English in the mother country of English”.
For those of you who have lived in Japan until now, English may have been a subject that you “had to study” or a subject that you “studied for exams”. However, here in Durham, English is not just a subject of knowledge but becomes a part of your life itself. If you have lived in Japan for a long time, you must have spoken Japanese unconsciously when living in Japan. Here, people who have lived in the UK will speak English unconsciously when living in the UK. Living in such an environment for the duration of the programme you are participating in will be a great experience for you and will allow you to experience a great change in the values you have cultivated up until now.
For those of you who are good at English and wanted to come to the UK, and for those of you who are not good at English and wanted to come to the UK to improve your English, Teikyo University of Japan in Durham is a place where you can take the first step with courage as the “protagonist of your own story” and, by enjoying your studies and life with the people living in the UK, you can gain important opportunities for your life to become the person you want to be in the future.
The fact that it is “different from Japan” is the first step in your own learning
The fact that “you can't communicate in your native Japanese” is the first step in your own growth.
However, don't worry. There are always staff who are native Japanese speakers at Durham campus. In other words, in the event of an unexpected situation like the coronavirus pandemic a few years ago, you can communicate in Japanese.
Durham is a quiet, peaceful city with a population of around 42,000, that is very British. It has a long history, dating back to 995 AD. Durham Cathedral, which is also a World Heritage Site, is visited by many pilgrims and tourists (it is also a filming location for the Harry Potter series). I hope that Durham, England, will become your “second home” in the future.
See you at Teikyo University of Japan in Durham!
April 2025, Prof Yukinori Okabe
Principal of Teikyo University of Japan in Durham