ASU strengthens ties with Huzhou University, China, with ceremony, events, April 21

April 20, 2009 -- Arkansas State University-Jonesboro will host a delegation this week from Huzhou University (HU), China. The delegation from Huzhou University will include Dr. Hu Zhangjian, president of Huzhou University, Dr. Liang Zhengyu, professor and dean of the School of Foreign Languages, and Dr. Zhang Guochen, professor and deputy dean of the Foreign Affairs Office. The delegation will visit this week, Monday-Friday, April 20-24. Several events are planned during the delegation’s visit.

The visit from the Huzhou delegation will mark the extension of a cooperative agreement between ASU-Jonesboro and Huzhou. Huzhou University has been an ASU-Jonesboro partner institution since 2006. The partnership was established to promote understanding through exchange of ideas, faculty, and students, along with the promotion of research and institutional development. 

Recently, ASU Chancellor Robert Potts visited Huzhou University. He remarked, “Our faculty and students could profit immensely by engaging with their counterparts both on our campus and in China.” Although this event marks the first visit to ASU-Jonesboro by a delegation from Huzhou University, Dr. Hu Zhangjian hopes this will not be the last. On Tuesday, April 21, Chancellor Potts and President Hu Zhangjian will officially sign an extension to the partnership between the universities. The signing ceremony will take place at 11 a.m. in the Administration Building lobby.


(From left) Jeff Jenness, Irene Potts and Robert Potts visit with Hu Zhangjian, president, and Fang Dawei, vice president and professor, at Huzhou University during the ASU contingent's trip to China in March.

In addition to the morning ceremony, Dr. Liang Zhengyu will present a special lecture, “Discovering China and Chinese Culture” on Tuesday, April 21, at 3:30 p.m. in the Osage Room of the Reng Student Services Center/Student Union, 101 N. Caraway Road, Jonesboro. This special lecture is hosted by ASU’s Department of Languages, chaired by Dr. Yvonne Unnold. Refreshments will be served, and the lecture is free and open to the public. For more information on Dr. Liang Zhengyu’s lecture, contact the Department of Languages at (870) 972-3887.

The two universities are working to establish a program where students from Huzhou University would be able to attend ASU-Jonesboro after completing two or three years of undergraduate study at Huzhou University. Those Chinese students would then come to ASU to complete their undergraduate work in one or two years. Upon completion, the students would receive degrees from both ASU-Jonesboro and Huzhou University.

Dr. Jeff Jenness, chair of ASU-Jonesboro’s Department of Computer Science in the College of Sciences and Mathematics, has been working with Huzhou University since 2005, and he accompanied Dr. Potts on the recent trip to China. Dr. Jenness has been assisted by Dr. Jie Miao, associate professor of mathematics in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at ASU-Jonesboro. Dr. Miao is a former classmate of Huzhou’s president Dr. Hu Zhangjian.

Huzhou University is located in Huzhou City, Zhejiang Province, approximately 2 hours southwest of Shanghai. The campus houses 12 schools: the School of Humanities, the School of Law and Business, the School of Foreign Languages, the School of Sciences, the School of Life Sciences, the School of Medicine, the School of Information Engineering, the School of Arts, the School of Physical Education, the School of Education Science and Technology, the School of Adult Education, the School of Qiouzhen, and 10 research institutes which offer 34 special fields of learning covering literature, law, history, economy, administration, education, science, engineering, and medicine. Currently, the university has approximately 15,000 full-time students.

For more information on the delegation’s visit, contact Dr. Jenness at (870) 972-3978, or e-mail jeff.jenness@cs.astate.edu. 
 

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