Yale, one of the world's most prestigious universities based in
the United States, stepped up cooperation with China's educational
institutions Monday, opening a biomedical research institute with
the elite Fudan
University in Shanghai.
Richard Levin, president of Yale, said the university's 17
faculties and colleges had established cooperative links with 45
colleges, universities or research institutes in 16 cities, with
jointly-sponsored research fields ranging from Shanghai's stock
market to the history of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), the last
dynasty of imperial China.
Levin said well-established student exchanges had become a
cornerstone of Sino-US relations.
Yale and Fudan were negotiating cooperation programs in sectors
like public health, law and management, said Levin.
"The three hundred Chinese students currently in residence play
a great role in Yale," Levin said.
Yale was proud of being the alma mater of Yung Wing, the first
Chinese student sent to the United States to receive a college
education in Yale in 1854.
But Chinese students presently contributed far more to Yale than
their forerunners. "We believe that every Yale student gains from
the presence of Chinese students," Levin said.
Chinese students accounted for 17 percent of the total foreign
students at Yale, and in the United States one in ten foreign
students was Chinese.
Levin said Chinese students mainly played a cultural exchange
role in the early days and their presence helped US people know
more about China. Chinese students now, however, were a major force
in academic research.
Many historic figures of late 19th century and early 20th
century China had been educated at Yale, including Zhan Tianyou,
the father of China's railways and one of the nation's first Yale
graduates, who was appointed the government's chief railway
engineer on his return.
The numbers of Chinese students in the United States had risen
each year since China loosened restrictions on studying abroad in
the 1980s and 1990s, and Yale and other leading US universities had
been the first choices of Chinese students.
But Yale did not feel satisfied to be a purely training
organization for Chinese students and sought institutional
cooperation, and the Fudan-Yale Biomedical Research Center is the
latest in such efforts.
On the other hand, Yale students had come to China too. Seven
American graduate students had received postgraduate programs in
Fudan. Levin said more Yale students come to China for their own
benefit, and the benefit of the people of Yale and even the United
States as a whole to know Chinese society and culture.
Levin said China had the world's greatest potential to build
first-class universities because of its long history of stressing
and investing in education. He suggested Chinese universities and
colleges invest more in research and expand exchanges with
educational institutions around the world.
(Xinhua News Agency November 12, 2003)