On December 15^th, 2022, the 14^th Joint Administrative Committee (hereinafter referred to as JAC) Meeting of QMES was held at the Conference Room 413 of East Teaching Building A, Chang’an Campus. 15 attendees from NPU and QMUL were present at the meeting, including Wan Xiaopeng, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee of NPU and Chair of JAC; Han Suomin, Director of Finance Department; Wang Jin, Deputy Director of Teaching Affairs Department (on behalf of the Director Wang Haipeng); Chen Jun, Deputy Director of International Cooperation Office (on behalf of the Director Zhang Fuli); Zhang Qiuyu, Dean of School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering; Li Heng, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee of School of Materials Science and Engineering (on behalf of the Dean Li Jinshan); Fan Xiaoli, Dean of QMES; Dai Fuping, Secretary of the Party Committee and Deputy Dean of QMES; Wen Wang, Vice Principal of QMUL and Vice Chair of JAC; Anthony Michael, Dean for Education of Faculty of Science and Engineering; Teresa Alonso-Rasgado, Dean for Global Engagement of Faculty of Science and Engineering; Hazel Screen, Head of School of Engineering and Materials Science; Anne Parry, Operating Officer for Faculty of Science and Engineering; Andy Bushby, Executive Vice Dean of QMES; Gabriel Cavalli, Co-director of International Center for Teaching and Learning. Vice Dean Cheng Yin of QMES and Education Manager Qi Yue attended the meeting as well.

The meeting was presided over by Wan Xiaopeng. He extended a warm welcome to the participants and staff of NPU and QMUL and appreciated all the faculty members for their hard work in the past year. It was them who worked together to ensure the smooth development of QMES and promote the quality of Sino-foreign cooperation in education. Among the 229 graduates of the class of 2022, 42 got postgraduate recommendations from domestic universities, 41 passed the National Postgraduate Entrance Examination, and 91 were admitted to Cambridge University, Imperial College London, University College London, National University of Singapore and other world-class universities for further study, which showed a promising future of QMES in educational performance. Besides, the recruitment work of 2022 undergraduates also achieved a lot. The overall quality of students has improved significantly, and the admission scores of students are higher than those of most universities of 211 Project and some universities of 985 Project. In addition, QMES was successfully elected as the third chairman unit of the Chinese-foreign Joint Institutes Committee, and 2 undergraduate programs won gold and silver awards in the 8^th China International “Internet Plus” Student Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition.

QMUL ranked top 100 in the world and the 11th in the UK in the latest U.S. News Best Global University Rankings 2022/23. Wen Wang expressed his congratulations on the achievements of QMUL and NPU and appreciations to the support and dedication of the two universities in educational cooperation. QMUL would give full support to the teaching work of the two universities, and it was hoped that the two universities would continue to strengthen cooperation, give full play to the educational resources, and upgrade the training of international talents.

Participants reviewed and approved the minutes of the 13th JAC Meeting. Then, Wen Wang reported on the appointment of the new Executive Vice Dean of QMES, in which Gabriel Cavalli was appointed as the new Executive Vice Dean and Wen Wang expressed his appreciation to Andy Bushby for his hard work during his tenure. Fan Xiaoli and Cheng Yin reported the teaching and student affairs of QMES in the 2022-2023 academic year respectively. Han Somin and Anne Parry reported the implementation of the 2022 financial budget and plan for the 2023 financial budget from both sides, which were approved at the meeting in principle and required QMES to submit to NPU for approval. Then, Fan Xiaoli, Dai Fuping, Gabriel Cavalli and Cheng Yin reported the recent work on NPU-QMUL Joint Research Institute for Advanced Materials and Structures, International Center for Teaching and Learning, and so on. The meeting discussed several issues and reached a number of consensus.

Thanks to the joint efforts of NPU and QMUL, the educational model and philosophy of QMES have attracted increasing attention at home and abroad. In view of the existing cooperation and the new development stage, QMES will continue to forge ahead; stick to the cultivation of high-level international talents and innovation of scientific research cooperation platform; actively cope with difficulties and challenges; vigorously carry out all-round communications; utilize the resources at home and abroad of the two universities; and establish and improve the high-quality talent cultivation system. In a word, QMES will remain committed to building a characteristic Sino-foreign cooperative institute, promoting the students’ career advancement, and writing a brilliant chapter of NPU on overseas talent training.

Text: Zhao Chunyi

Editor: Wu Sijia

Translator: Liu Yang

Review: Fan Xiaoli