The 19thAnnual Presidents’ Meeting on Building World-Class Universities, hosted by Fudan University, was held in Qingpu District of Shanghai on October 15 and 16. The meeting has been aimed at facilitating the development of top Chinese universities into world-class ones through exchanges and cooperation since its initiation in 2003.
This year’s meeting focuses on how Chinese universities can fulfill the goal of building world-class universities with Chinese characteristics through understanding the new development stage, applying the new development philosophy, and creating a new development dynamic, thus boosting high-quality development.
The event was joined by the heads of 14 top Chinese universities including Peking University, Tsinghua university, Harbin Institute of Technology, Fudan University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Nanjing University, Zhejiang University, University of Science and Technology of China, Xi’an Jiaotong University, University of Hong Kong, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, University of Macau and Macau University of Science and Technology.
Xu Ningsheng, president of Fudan University
Xu Ningsheng, president of Fudan University, presided over the opening ceremony.
Hao Ping, president of Peking University
Hao Ping, president of Peking University, Wu Zhaohui, president of Zhejiang University, Bao Xinhe, president of University of Science and Technology of China and Han Jiecai, president of Harbin Institute of Technology presided over the 14 presidents’ speeches in the two days.
Jiao Yang, chair of Fudan University Council
Jiao Yang, chair of Fudan University Council, addressed the opening ceremony. She said the construction of world-class universities is an important move in strengthening China’s education, and Fudan University has always aligned its development with that of the country and pursues excellence in every respect relentlessly. Fudan hopes to further exchanges and cooperation with nationwide universities to achieve the shared goal of transforming themselves into world-class universities, offering our experience in building world-class universities with Chinese characteristics for other universities.
Hong Dayong, deputy director of the Academic Degrees Committee Office of the State Council
Hong Dayong, deputy director of the Academic Degrees Committee Office of the State Council, pointed out this year marks the beginning of a new round of world-class university construction. Since 2017 when the list of the universities included in the first-round of world-class university construction was announced, the Ministry of Education has been improving the overall rules and regulations, evaluating the results of the construction projects and adjusting strategies and policies accordingly. With the concerted effort of all universities, the goals for the first round have been attained in general.
Yu Shaoliang, deputy secretary of the CPC Shanghai Municipal Committee
Yu Shaoliang, deputy secretary of the CPC Shanghai Municipal Committee, said in his speech that further cooperation between government agencies and universities is expected. We should speed up talent fostering and improve meta-innovation capability to achieve greater achievements in development of the city and universities and serve national strategic needs.
Highlights of Speeches by 14 University Heads
Zhang Pingwen, vice president of Peking University
Today, scientific and technological innovation has become the main front of international competition. As an important innovation force of a country, top research-oriented universities should take on the mission of developing technologies with wholly owned intellectual properties. To strengthen the role of scientific and technological innovation in national strategies, we should continue to step up basic research, solve difficult problems that hinders the country’s development, and attract outstanding talents from around the world. Top universities should combine the advantages of in-depth research in fundamental disciplines and cross-disciplinary collaborations in order to obtain science and technology achievements strategically vital to the country’s development.
Rocky Sung-chi TUAN, president of Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK)
The Chinese University of Hong Kong has launched the CUHK Strategic Plan 2021–2025 (“CUHK 2025”), which aims to achieve the vision of “Excellence with Purpose and Responsibility”, including promoting innovation capacity as well as enhancing interdisciplinary integration and technology application. CUHK aims at becoming an international hub for science, technology and innovation in Hong Kong by promoting interdisciplinary research cooperation, improving regulations that stimulate innovation, and facilitating the transformation of research findings into influential ones. Guided by national strategic needs, universities should play a leading role in the upstream of scientific research, distribute resources properly in different disciplines and cultivate innovative talents to boost China’s innovation.
Lin Zhongqin, president of Shanghai Jiao Tong University
China’s top research-oriented universities must not hesitate to invest in and lead national development. Bearing in mind world peace and human progress as well as the development of the country’s strategic areas in science and technology, we will require our students to be ambitious and virtuous, conduct research that leads to revolutionary results and huge advances in various sectors. We will turn our students into leading experts in the world, carry out major meta-innovation projects in a forward-looking manner and resolve bottleneck issues in scientific research to boost the development of emerging industries and regional innovation centers.
Zeng Rong, vice president of Tsinghua University
Universities are the main forces in conducting fundamental research and achieving major research breakthroughs. We should improve our pro-innovation mechanisms, foster innovative talents, build major scientific and technological platforms and become a place to share the latest scientific progress and conduct international exchanges. Leading universities should intensify efforts to tackle issues in key areas, innovating organizational structures and continuously investing resources in major projects and platforms. We can build partnerships with national-level laboratories, research institutions and leading enterprises in science and technology, so that with joint effort, we can transform ourselves better into science and technology forces that serve national needs.
Wang Shuguo, president of Xi'an Jiaotong University
The research and education in universities should respond to the concerns of the world, the country, the society and the people. Xi'an Jiaotong University took the initiative to align its development with national and social development, and established the Sci-Tech Innovation Harbor in western China. The Harbor focuses on the frontiers of science, promotes interdisciplinary integration, deepens the university-industry cooperation, and explores how innovation resources can be better allocated to find a new path for the high-quality development of China’s higher education so as to provide a new model for universities to contribute to the economy and the society.
Gong Peng, vice president of the University of Hong Kong (HKU)
HKU aims at the frontier and key areas of science and technology and promotes interdisciplinary integration. We will deepen cooperation between enterprises, universities and research institutes and promote the high-tech research with wholly-owned intellectual properties, drive innovation in key regions in line with national strategies, and deepen exchanges with international partners. To be world-class universities, we should make contribution to national strategies in science and technology by strengthening fundamental research capabilities and stepping up our leadership in more research areas.
Wu Zhaohui, president of Zhejiang University
An innovation-driven university should see science and technology as its primary productive force, talents its primary resource, innovation its primary motivation. It should integrate innovation with education, leading innovative research and focusing on the practical application of research results. Facing the future, the best way for innovation-driven universities to facilitate China’s science and technology development is to become China’s backbone in innovation through striving for excellence in certain research areas, promoting pro-innovation mechanisms, boosting interdisciplinary integration and digital governance to accelerate indigenous scientific innovation.
Lu Jian, president of Nanjing University
Nanjing University will respond to the needs of the times, implement the core requirements and set up critical goals; establish an overall system featuring self-reliant scientific and technological innovation, international cooperation, quality higher education and cultural prosperity. Based on China’s 14th Five-Year Plan and Vision 2035, Nanjing University has proposed a new paradigm in innovation-driven scientific research, which is rooted in fundamental research and involves technology development and practical application. Nanjing University will face up to the new challenges during the construction of a national strategic platform for science and technology by stepping up its own innovation mechanism.
Wang Yang, vice president of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
Universities should provide a more comprehensive and integrated approach to education to foster students who are competitive, socially responsible and internationally minded to cope with the increasingly complex realities of the world. The challenge of COVID-19 also calls for education institutions to provide assistance to less developed parts of the world. At a time when national and regional development is increasingly depending on science and technology innovation, universities have an important role to play: to transform research into real solutions, to become the solution providers for the future of education, and to act as a powerful force connecting sectors and government agencies to tackle common challenges.
Bao Xinhe, president of University of Science and Technology of China (USTC)
In this new era, the University of Science and Technology of China has been making great effort in climbing up to the peak of science and technology. USTC is devoting itself to cultivating virtuous and capable personnel, making breakthroughs in innovation, striving to become a source of meta-innovation and developing key technologies to help build China into a science and technology power in the world.
Joseph Hun-wei LEE, president of Macau University of Science and Technology
Macau University of Science and Technology positions itself as a university rooted in Macau, aligning itself with the development of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and serving the needs of the entire country. We expand our domestic and international research partner networks through various ways, and take the networks as an opportunity to explore more promising disciplines and continue to bridge China and the rest of the world in research and academics. We will vigorously promote interdisciplinary and cutting-edge research, introduce more leading talents abroad, encourage teamwork, integrate resources, and promote academic development in diverse ways.
Han Jiecai, president of Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT)
Harbin Institute of Technology aims at the common cause of mankind and dedicates itself to the shared dream of exploring the vast universe. We adhere to the principle of innovation, pragmatism and cooperation to strengthen our advantageous disciplines, and participate in the country’s strategic planning for the aerospace industry by producing professional personnel and developing key space technologies. HIT will transform itself from a top university in aerospace in China into a world leader in this field.
Song Yonghua, rector of the University of Macau
The University of Macau is striving to build a collaborative, open and innovative research-oriented university. Making full use of the state key laboratories in microelectronics and traditional Chinese medicine, the University of Macau contributes to the needs of the country by focusing on cutting-edge research areas. The University of Macau has put forward a new approach that targets major problems, adopts cross-disciplinary methods and aims for breakthroughs in key areas. The university’s state key laboratory for research on Internet of Things and the research projects on cognitive and brain science are two good examples.
Xu Ningsheng, president of Fudan University
Universities should find their unique positioning. Top comprehensive universities should be global hubs of educational, academic and cultural excellence, making research effort in the most critical subject areas, blazing the trail in the most cutting-edge areas, striving to make the most prominent contribution and dedicating themselves to the progress of human civilization to their best capability.
The country’s goal of turning into an international center of talents, education and science and technology by 2035 has injected strong impetus into the development of China’s higher education. Universities should take advantage of their own human resource, namely teachers and students. As innovation and creation are key to development, we should fully mobilize the university leaders, teachers and students and raise their awareness of the importance of innovation and creative work.
It is necessary for each university to set its own development vision, overall targets and goals for each stage, and to learn from others’ experience instead of blindly copying others’ practice. To become a world-class university, it is important to be the best at what we do ourselves, rather than the best at what others do. We should pursue excellence through cooperation, exchanges and competition, and pay more attention to our reputation among the public than that recorded by rankings and indicators.
Fudan will prioritize the development of the five disciplines in turn, boost the development of cross-disciplinary areas and newly set-up frontier disciplines. We will vigorously enhance our education and research capabilities, and produce outstanding scholars who can take on the mission of national rejuvenation, especially in the young generation.
At the meeting, Fudan University also signed the cooperation agreements with the University of Macau, the Macau University of Science and Technology and the University of Hong Kong to contribute to the development of Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and Hengqin Guangdong-Macao In-depth Cooperation Zone.
