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The COVID-19 pandemic has compelled higher educational institutions to implement alternative educational strategies that rely heavily on internet accessibility and utilisation to monitor and evaluate students. This study aims to find certain indicators for planning and designing future courses of inclusive online education in the domain of disaster risk reduction (DRR).

The study reviews and analyses online teaching and learning experiences of DRR courses. It uses online surveys and interviews to derive the perspectives of selected students and educators in universities in Asia and the Pacific region.

Active engagement is considered to be achieved when students are active in chat boxes, through presentations, through assignments and when the video cameras of students are turned on. On the contrary, students perceive active engagement differently because they face emotional disturbances and health issues due to prolonged screen/digital device use, have inadequate information and communications technology infrastructure or have digital literacy deficiencies among others. The study finds that online courses have many sets of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, when they are balanced, they can improve DRR courses in the future.

The study is based on the outcome of interviews with 10 experienced educators in DRR courses as well as students from different schools taking courses in DRR education. However, the students are not necessarily taking the courses of the educators interviewed due to the inability of some educators to avail themselves and the challenge of contacting the students. This notwithstanding, the results of this study give a general overview of the situation to be considered in the planning and design of online and distance education.

The results do not reflect the reaction of students and tutors of the same course. Future studies of collecting and analyzing the responses from the students and the educators with the same course could provide tailored solutions.

This study attempts to find solutions to bridging two different perspectives on teaching and learning. The results would be important to strengthening and designing future online courses.

Foreign residents in Japan are classified as one vulnerable group at risk of disasters. Therefore, various measures are in place to engage, educate and offer first-hand experiences of disaster countermeasures required to overcome systematic disaster preparedness problems. However, the need for Japan to prevent the spread and infection of COVID-19 has necessitated measures that prohibit public gatherings and other social activities. This study aims to look at how these arrangements have impacted public engagement approaches to disaster preparedness for foreign residents within the Tokyo Metropolitan Area.

This study identifies local organizations and examines their methods of engagement that enhance the disaster preparedness of foreign residents in the Tokyo Metropolitan Area. The activities are examined in the context of when there was no COVID-19 pandemic and the current state of the pandemic. A change in activities attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic is then extracted and explained through field surveys and interviews with the relevant organization.

This study reveals that most disaster preparedness activities were best accomplished through in-person engagements. Nevertheless, online engagements have become the alternative option because of COVID-19 infection prevention. This change has widen the coverage of some activities but major setbacks include events cancelations and technical and technological challenges attributed to using online platforms.

This study did not examine the effectiveness of pre-COVID-19 pandemic engagement approaches and current changes attributed to the pandemic; many public engagement literatures acknowledge success to include the number of participants, the abilities of organizations to find ways to effectively and positively engage their stakeholders for meaningful partnerships, the number of clicks, access to a website and comments made online. Therefore, as organizations in this study have shown a glimpse of the above characteristics, there are indications of some level of effectiveness in their engagement approaches even amid a pandemic.

To avoid such situations in the future, there is the need for the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, local governments and associated organizations to develop public engagement approaches that are flexible to resist or cope with in-person, remote encounters, or sudden circumstances that could potentially derail planned activities.

The most effects attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic are the cancelation of many disaster drill exercises, community disaster walks, training of volunteers for foreign residents’ assistance and many hours of “Yasashii Nihongo” lesson. The cancelation of activities is a setback to the efforts of self-help and mutual aid campaigns by authorities to reduce the impacts of disasters.

The spirit of inclusion has been an embodiment of disaster management approaches in Japan for years for which policy recognitions have been tagged along the dimensions of public aid, self-help and mutual aid. These are aimed at engaging the populace, especially foreign residents in disaster training and exercises, language study and other communal activities for disaster preparedness. However, to prevent the spread of COVID-19, there have been a series of restrictions on gathering and inter-personal public engagement activities in Japan. As foreigners are classified as the most vulnerable to disaster in Japan, it is important to understand how these restrictions will/are affecting the efforts of integration and disaster preparedness, which are a crucial part of the Government’s effort to reduce casualties and damage in the anticipated Nankai megathrust earthquake. Besides the results being useful for government interventions, it also adds to the knowledge of the repercussion of COVID-19 and how to plan for emergencies.

The Sendai framework for disaster risk reduction (DRR) 2015–2030 offers guidelines to reduce disaster losses and further delivers a wake-up call to be conscious of disasters. Its four priorities hinge on science, technology and innovations as critical elements necessary to support the understanding of disasters and the alternatives to countermeasures. However, the changing dynamics of current and new risks highlight the need for existing approaches to keep pace with these changes. This is further relevant as the timeline for the framework enters its mid-point since its inception. Hence, this study reflects on the aspirations of the Sendai framework for DRR through a review of activities conducted in the past years under science, technology and innovations.

Multidimensional secondary datasets are collected and reviewed to give a general insight into the DRR activities of governments and other related agencies over the past years with case examples. The results are then discussed in the context of new global risks and technological advancement.

It becomes evident that GIS and remote sensing embedded technologies are spearheading innovations for DRR across many countries. However, the severity of the Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated innovations that use artificial intelligence-based technologies in diverse ways and has thus become important to risk management. These notwithstanding, the incorporation of science, technology and innovations in DRR faces many challenges. To mitigate some of the challenges, the study proposes reforms to the scope and application of science and technology for DRR, as well as suggests a new framework for risk reduction that harnesses stakeholder collaborations and resource mobilizations.

The approach and proposals made in this study are made in reference to known workable processes and procedures with proven successes. However, contextual differences may affect the suggested approaches.

The study provides alternatives to risk reduction approaches that hinge on practically tested procedures that harness inclusivity attributes deemed significant to the Sendai framework for DRR 2015–2030.