UK-China ventures shape education landscape

Bob Cryan (right), vice-chancellor of the University of Huddersfield and Ian Gow OBE (left), executive president of SBC, with Feng Chuan (middle), who graduated with a First Class honors and won the Huddersfield special outstanding student award. Provided to China Daily

Since the Chinese government approved preferential policies in 2003, Sino-foreign joint education ventures have become integrated into the fabric of modern China's education system.

Of course, joint-venture programs have existed in China for a long time, but the law opened the door for new joint-venture programs with courses taught entirely in English as well as a portfolio of degree programs that use foreign academic excellence to meet Chinese needs.

This is seen as beneficial in terms of providing examples of world-class university education models for China. Likewise, it benefits Chinese families because these ventures offer the opportunity to obtain a foreign degree at a time when China is working to internationalize and reform its education system.

These universities will allow young Chinese to avoid the high living expenses, tuition and fees required to study overseas for long periods.

Foreign governments too are increasingly aware of the potential of these joint ventures to build capacity in terms of producing internationally minded, culturally sensitive, linguistically skilled and educated manpower to meet their needs for their growing presence in trade and manufacturing in and with China.

The United Kingdom has unquestionably taken the lead in developing these new institutions, with three of the four major joint ventures licensed under the 2003 legislation being British - the fourth is Hong Kong Baptist.

The enrollment for all three has now exceeded 10,000 Chinese students, including a growing number of international students at the undergraduate and postgraduate levels.

They have all graduated their first cohorts of successful students and are now also developing significant research as well as teaching resources.

The three are: a joint venture between the University of Nottingham and Wanli University at Ningbo, the Xian-Jiaotong Liverpool University at Suzhou and the University of Shanghai for Science and Technology collaboration with a consortium of nine UK universities called the Northern Consortium to create the Sino-British University College in Shanghai.

These three are still the only significant foreign joint ventures created under the 2003 law, but the United States and other countries are exploring similar joint-venture campus developments.

While the Nottingham and Liverpool joint ventures are now well known, the Sino-British College is less so.

Sino-British college

Located in central Shanghai on a beautiful and historically significant campus, it offers a superbly attractive location for its 2,000 undergraduates from all over China and abroad, giving them a chance to study in one of the world's great cities.

The campus is located on a historical site known formerly as the German College and later the French College, which specialized in engineering and medicine.

The buildings are listed as significant historical landmarks and were specifically referenced in the Treaty of Versailles after World War I.

SBC could be considered China's first joint-venture higher education campus since the treaty clause declares that the campus would be jointly owned by the Chinese and the French governments.

The establishment of this Sino-UK joint venture not only creates a British presence but continues a European legacy of degree education, particularly in the field of engineering, which dates back over 100 years.

SBC offers an innovative variant of the standard joint venture, which is normally an equal partnership between two university institutions. SBC instead joins one Chinese university with a consortium of nine leading UK universities.

This offers a very wide choice for SBC students. The model is also different from the others because it takes students from the top tier of the national entrance examination via USST but at a very low fee, thus offering bright children from less well-off families the opportunity to get a UK degree plus a Chinese degree.

SBC also takes students directly from all over China and abroad, and its four-year degree plan offers many of them a second chance to obtain the higher marks needed to enter top university degree program within the consortium.

Last year, SBC graduated its first students who completed all their studies in Shanghai in the fields of electrical and mechanical engineering and in events management, and more than 97 percent went on immediately to master's courses or found jobs with multinationals and internationally minded Chinese companies.

SBC and the other colleges offer UK students, many of whom are now considering studying in the United States and Europe, the opportunity to study at leading UK institutions in China, which will undoubtedly enhance their international awareness and their employability.

SBC places great emphasis on social responsibility and its students through their societies and through the events management degree projects, the school has been highly active in organizing events, especially fundraising events for those in need of assistance.

These activities, while clearly designed to create socially responsible global citizens, also offer the opportunity to develop leadership, teambuilding and other people and planning skills in addition to provide experience working under deadline.

The UK government is increasingly aware of the contribution that higher education institutions can make to promoting and supporting trade, investment and manufacturing relations between the United Kingdom and China.

In addition, the students who graduate from these UK joint ventures will come away with specialized, in-demand skill sets and the experience of living in 21st century China.

Chinese students and also their fellow students from more than 30 countries are specially qualified linguistically and culturally to enhance cultural and diplomatic as well as economic relations.

After graduation, these students can help China better understand the United Kingdom and other countries as well as help the outside world to better understand China.

The nine UK universities in the SBC consortium are The University of Bradford, The University of Huddersfield, The University of Leeds, Leeds Metropolitan University, Liverpool John Moores University, Manchester Metropolitan University, The University of Salford, The University of Sheffield and Sheffield Hallam University.

The author Ian Gow OBE is executive president & CEO of the Sino-British University College, Shanghai. From 2003 to 2007, he was founding Provost (Executive President) & CEO of the University of Nottingham Ningbo, China - China's first independent foreign university campus under the 2003 legislation.

He is a professor of Asian business and former vice president of the Universities of Stirling, Sheffield and the West of England as well as vice president (Asia) of the University of Nottingham.

He was awarded the Camelia Award from the Municipal Government of Ningbo and the West Lake Award from Zhejiang province for outstanding contribution to higher education and is special adviser to the President of Shanghai University of Science and Technology. Gow was awarded the OBE in the New Year's Honors List (2007) for his services to British Higher Education in China.

For China Daily

(China Daily 03/13/2012 page16)