March, 18, 2021 --- “We are working harder than ever to design and provide our students with much more opportunities to gain study-abroad experiences in the next five years, and we are about to get that”, said Prof. Zhai, Tianrui, the chairperson of the Faculty of Science, while attending the 2021 Spring Semester BJUT Internationalization Promotion Conference, held in Science Building. The aim of this early-spring conference is to push forward the strategies to be implemented in the new semester and the future years. Representatives from International Office, heads and secretaries in charge of global affairs from all faculties, colleges, and associated departments attended the conference. The conference was presided over by Prof. Liu, Zhaomiao, director of BJUT International Office.

A review report was made by Prof. Liu, Zhaomiao, about the work carried out and progress achieved in the past five years. She also addressed the challenges of global affairs under the scenario of pandemic influence through SWOT analysis. The last part of the report was a suggestion on the directional guidelines and focal points for the spring semester and the next five years. Prof. Liu, Zenghua, the dean of College of International Education, made a second speech right afterwards, focusing on how to implement the reconstruction of the College of International Education towards establishing a unique living and learning community, as a partial fulfillment of the requirements from the newly approved accreditation of international education programs.

In the closing speech, Prof. Guo, Fu, Vice President for global affairs, acknowledged the achievements obtained through the joint efforts of all university community during the past years, while reemphasized the importance of global education and collaboration in the university strategic development in the new era. He noted that internationalization of a university is not an independent responsibility, but must comply with the educational objectives of each program and discipline. Such responsibility must be carried out along with the requirements and needs from stakeholders, like the national and local socio-economic development and planning, the world-class research university strategy, and the university diversity and outreach goals, etc. Under such scheme, each undergraduate program and graduate discipline has to take leading roles to design and establish its own initiatives to enable international education and cooperation an indispensable part in the strategic planning. “The future is very optimistic for our world-class university initiatives”, he encouraged all participants, and reminded that “the success of internationalization depends on nothing but a joint effort from all faculty, staff, and students, with updated philosophy and approaches to be adaptive to the ever-changing global situations”. In the last part of the speech, he also indicated that safety and security awareness should be practiced in all policy development and advisory.