What is Guardian Project?

Guardian is an app that was designed to detect child abuse and bullying, which can be installed on tablets and smartphones, in order for children to complete welfare questionnaires anytime, anywhere.

  • Prioritizes the protection of personal information
  • Age-appropriate questions to ensure easy understanding within different age groups (lower elementary school, upper elementary school, junior high and high school)
  • Conforms with widely used and established psychological surveys in the U.K. and U.S.
  • Bilingual (Japanese and English) to accommodate foreign students

Guardian was conceived during WISE Kumamoto (Creating New Social Values for Sustainable Communities), a workshop sponsored by Kumamoto Prefecture held in May 2019. After winning the grand prize for the idea, the Guardian project began.

Donate to Guardian App Development (in US$）

Timeline

  • May 2019 – Caitlin won the prize for best idea at JSIE’s WISE Kumamoto workshop
  • December 2019 – Prototype development began
  • August 2020 – Domestic patent filed
  • February 2021 ~ Testing began in Kumamoto City public elementary and junior high schools
  • August 2021 – Version II Upgrade
  • November 2021 – Caitlin Nominated for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at the British Chamber of Commerce in Japan (BCCJ) British Business Awards
  • January 2022 ~ Version II testing in Kumamoto City schools
  • April 2022 ~ Awarded grant from Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation
  • May 2022 ～ Kyoto Smart City Startup Grant awarded
  • June 2022 ~ Launched Diversity & Inclusion workshops
  • October 2022 Caitlin nominated for British Business 2022 Study UK Alumni of the Year & 2022 Diversity Equity and Inclusion 
  • November 2022 Caitlin is selected as Phoenixi’s Cohort7 members
Workshop details are here
★Guardian Advisory Board

Guardian Advisory Board:

Mr. Makoto Nakamura, Dr. Sachiko Kuno, Dr. Kiyoshi Kurokawa, Ms. Shuri Fukunaga, and Mr. Tomoya Mukai

Guardian Project leader featured Media:

(For any inquiries regarding Guardian, please contact guardian @ jsie.net）

★Project Leaders
Caitlin Puzzar

After graduating from Keele University (UK) in 2016, with a BA in Criminology with Japanese, Caitlin joined the JET Programme. She is now working as an Assistant Language Teacher (ALT) and Vice Prefectural Advisor in Kumamoto City, Japan. Through a strong interest in community involvement and service to others, she has held roles such as ALT project manager, international student peer mentor, volunteer at community justice centres & police stations, along with time as a police cadet. She is also an initiated member of the Chi Omega women’s fraternity (Chi Zeta chapter). She joined JSIE after attending the Kumamoto WISE Special in 2019. With JSIE’s support, she is currently working to develop a pioneering project, designed to detect abuse & neglect within Japanese school children.

Hiromi Murakami
As a former system engineer, Hiromi Murakami leads system development design of Guardian. Murakami is the Founder and President of JSIE. Prior to founding JSIE, she’s involved in various policy projects in US/Japanese institutions, including Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) Global Health Policy Center, the Health and Global Policy Institute (HGPI), and Economic Strategy Institute. Currently Murakami is a Visiting Scholar at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo, Japan. Prior she led Asia research as a vice president at the Economic Strategy Institute in Washington, D.C. She has completed Women’s Startup Lab program in Silicon Valley. She holds an M.B.A. from St. Mary’s College, a Ph.D. in international relations from Johns Hopkins SAIS, and B.S. in Physics from Sophia University, Tokyo.