On October 7, 2013 NAIST held the 6th NAIST Gender Equality Promotion Symposium "Work & Private Life and Career Design: Working for your Career in this Day and Age" at the Millennium Hall. This symposium was planned and arranged by the Graduate School of Materials Science. Including attendees from the general public, 269 people gathered to listen to the talks, the highest number of attendees to date.

Following an introduction by NAIST President Naotake Ogasawara, lectures were given by Maki Kawai (Executive Director, RIKEN), Emiko Hamada (Professor, Nagoya Institute of Technology Graduate School), and Nobumasa Yoshida (Global HR Group Leader, Personnel Department, Mitsui Chemicals, Inc.). In their talks the speakers gave advice to the attendees based on their experiences concerning how they can plan their careers. In later responses some attendees gave opinions such as, "I felt motivated to try hard once again in the research world." and "It was very beneficial to hear about company management and organization before entering the workforce." After hearing these lectures we can see there is a slowly developing awareness change in the NAIST staff.