Bangkok--29 Jun--Asian Institute of Technology
China’s top universities have benefited from working closely with Western universities, in recent years. Now, a number of leading Chinese universities aim to establish partnership arrangements with well-known higher education institutions in Southeast Asia, including the Asian Institute of Technology (AIT).
That was the message Chinese diplomats and senior university administrators brought to AIT during a visit on 20 June 2014. Joined by Mr. Zhou Gaoyu, First Secretary for Education, China Embassy, Thailand, a large delegation representing the ASEAN-China Centre in Beijing and high-ranking officials from The Excellent Alliance of University (E9) consortium expressed a collective desire to work with AIT.
“China wants to emphasize cooperative relations with Thailand’s universities,” said Mr. Zhou, praising AIT as amongst the country’s best higher education institutes. China will support many more students to study in Thailand in the future, he added. Mr. Wang Daoyu, Deputy Director of Education at the ASEAN-China Centre based in Beijing, accompanied the delegation.
The visitors included senior representatives from Harbin Institute of Technology, Dalian University of Technology, Beijing Institute of Technology, Southeast University, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, and Tianjin University. All members of The E9 rank highly in national and international university rankings.
“We believe it’s high time to work with our neighbors,” said delegation leader Dr. Yang Fuling, Director, Office of International Cooperation, Tianjin University, who explained that the E9 promotes its programs together as group. All members of the grouping are amongst China’s finest “first top tier” research intensive universities, she said.
Welcoming the guests, AIT Interim President Prof. Worsak Kanok-Nukulchai led a meeting focused on opportunities for faculty and student exchanges, and cooperation in academic programs and research projects. He said that China has a number of world-class universities which could benefit from more internationalization.
The president invited each university to send their faculty members to teach at AIT on special secondment, just as the United States, Europe and Japan have done. “AIT can be your gateway to connect with universities across Asia and beyond and to build up your international faculty networks,” President Worsak said.
Each E9 member university representative introduced their respective institution, and later exchanged individual friendship tokens with the AIT president.
Photo caption: Mr. Zhou Gaoyu (left) with Prof. Worsak Kanok-Nukulchai.