Rapid globalization has meant that greatly increased attention is now paid to the many challenges that confront us in East Asia. How, for example, can we strengthen regional ties between our countries to tackle problems that cannot be solved by any one country unilaterally? What can be done to enable businesses with understanding of the Asian marketplace to deploy their skills and resources to compete internationally? Where regional challenges meet global challenges, there is a pressing need to foster individuals with a deep understanding of the culture and customs of the three countries in our collaboration, who can tackle the challenges we face through their expertise and communication skills. Asia is now a in the spotlight of world attention. For East Asia to thrive as an international hub, we particularly need specialists from the region itself, experts for whom borders are not barriers, those who can put on a new cultural identity like a new suit of clothes and see through the same eyes that were once foreign to them. Such expertise boils down to the feel of a culture, acquired in the cultivation of practical skills that could not be obtained in any theoretical study. One of the aims of this program of student exchanges between top-ranking Japanese, Chinese and Korean universities is to nurture such abilities. From lessons learned side by side with colleagues from other countries come bonds that propagate into networks, which in turn coalesce to create an East Asian international community. We are the springboard to such a future.