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Zhejiang University — news, coverage & facts — IJR

1928–1949: national university

After the closure of Cheking Higher Institute, the attempts to restore the institute was unsuccessful due to conflicts between warlords. After the Northern Expedition in July 1927, the Kuomintang (KMT) took control of Hangzhou and established the National Third Chungshan University, by merging Chekiang Industrial College and Chekiang Agricultural College on the original site of Qiushi Academy. On April 1, 1928, the institution was renamed Chekiang University, and later that year it was renamed National Chekiang University (NCKU), with Jiang Menglin, an alumnus and teacher of Qiushi, as its first president.

In 1929, Jiang was succeeded by Shao Peizi, also an alumnus and teacher of Qiushi. Shao refused to join KMT, which led to a tense relationship between the university and the government, and the government withdrew funding in 1932, leading to Shao's resignation. Cheng Tien-fong, a member of the KMT, was then appointed by the Nationalist government as the new president. Under his leadership, with the personal intervention of Chiang Kai-shek, the university began to receive direct funding from the central government.

In March 1933, Kuo Zing-Yang, another KMT member, became president. But as the Sino-Japanese conflict intensified and the Nationalist government's response to the invasion was perceived as lenient, its popularity waned. This discontent culminated in the December 9 Movement of 1935, when students ousted Kuo from office, accusing him of collaborating with the police to arrest student demonstrators.Chu Kochen, a scholar with no previous political appointments, was recommended to Chiang Kai-shek by Chen Bulei for the presidency of NCKU in April 1936. Kochen's inauguration was presided over by Jiang Menglin. Backed by Chen Bulei's strong financial backing and authority to make political appointments within the university, Chu was able to attract leading members of the Science Society of China and the Critical Review Group. In the second half of 1937, with the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War and the advance of the Japanese army, the university was forced to move from Hangzhou, first to Yishan, then to Zunyi, and finally to Meitan in Guizhou Province in southwest China. During this period, the students of NCKU took on the responsibility of safeguarding Zhejiang's historical collections, including the Complete Library of the Four Treasuries housed in the Wenlan Pavilion, to prevent their capture by Japanese forces.

In March 1945, Fei Gong, an NCKU professor and critic of the Nationalist government, disappeared in Chongqing in what was later proved to be a government assassination. In September, with the surrender of Japan, a group of NCKU professors led by Luo Zongluo were ordered by the government to take over the Japanese Imperial University in Taiwan. In October, the students and faculty who had retreated to Longquan began to return to Hangzhou, while those who had retreated to Guizhou returned in May 1946 with the help of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration. The university set up its first medical school on the instructions of the Ministry of Education.

In late 1947, the death of Yu Zisan, the president of the university's student union, led to strikes and protests. While Chu attempted to strike a balance between his students and the Nationalist government, his relationship with the students worsened and he moved to Shanghai, upon the request of the Nationalist government. But he eventually did not move to Taiwan and secretly stayed at the Academia Sinica building in Shanghai, until the Communist takeover of the NCKU campus in May 1949.

1949–1976: Mao Zedong era

In August 1948, Ma Yinchu was appointed as the university president, who promoted communist education and organisations within the university. In 1950, the new Ministry of Education instructed all universities to remove "National" from their names. Hence the university's name was changed to its present name in Chinese, or Zhejiang University (ZJU). The communist education among faculty evolved into the Thought Reform and Three-anti and Five-anti Campaigns after Ma was appointed the president of Peking University in 1949. ZJU scholars such as Su Buqing, Tan Jiazhen, Wang Guosong became targets of political prosecution.

In the early 1950s, the university underwent a series of re-organisation, which aimed to establish a Soviet-styled education system, to eventually became an engineering-focused university., which only had the departments of electrical engineering, chemical engineering, civil engineering and mechanical engineering. The engineering school of Hangchow University merged into ZJU. The university's College of Agriculture became an independent university, named Zhejiang Agricultural University. The university's medical school merged into Zhejiang Provincial Medical College to become Zhejiang Medical College. The departments of Chinese Literature, Foreign Literature and Education was merged into Zhejiang Teachers College and relocated to the campus of Hangchow University. The faculty of College of Sciences were sent to Chinese Academy of Sciences.

In 1954, the university moved from Daxue Road to Yuquan. Liu Dan, the university's Party Secretary, restored sciences research and education as part of the university's engineering offerings. In 1963, ZJU was selected as one of the National Key Universities.In 1966, the Cultural Revolution broke out and the university ceased to function. Liu Dan was removed from office after being attacked by the Zhejiang Daily and the People's Daily. There was an emergence of radical groups in favour of Cultural Revolution. In August, the ZJU students confronted with younger red guards, who were mostly high school students, to protect Lingyin Temple from their attempts to destroy Four Olds. In 1967, at a meeting with Tan Zhenlin in Beijing, red guards from ZJU were told that Mao Zedong wanted to protect Jiang Hua in this revolution. This led to a split within red guards in Zhejiang, particularly with another faction led by Zhang Yongsheng from the Chinese Academy of Art, who wanted to persecute Jiang Hua. The two factions fought each other constantly throughout the Cultural Revolution.

1976 to present

With the end of the Cultural Revolution in 1976, Liu returned to ZJU as the honorary president, the only by far. In November 1980, ZJU became co-funded by both Ministry of Education and Zhejiang's provincial government.

In 1989, Zhejiang University students, along with more than 10 other universities in Hangzhou, demonstrated in Wulin Square in support of the democracy movement in Beijing. After hearing of the massacre in Beijing, the student protesters blocked the railway at Nanxingqiao station with their bodies for three days before negotiating with the vice-governor, Chai Songyue. At least 60 passenger trains and 166 freight trains were blocked during the protest.

Since 1988 to 1995, Lu Yongxiang assumed the president of Zhejiang University, during which he made "pursuing innovation" part of the university motto and reformed teaching and research systems, including introduction of the program of Advanced Honor Class of Engineering Education.

In 1995, it was selected into Project 211. In 1997, Wang Ganchang and Bei Shizhang in Beijing, and Su Buqing and Tan Jiazhen in Shanghai, wrote a joint letter to the then General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, Jiang Zemin, recommending a merger of the four universities. In 1998, with the approval of the State Council, the new Zhejiang University was established as a merger of four major universities. With over 30,000 students and 10,000 staff, the new Zhejiang University was considered the largest higher education institution in Asia. Zhang Junsheng was appointed Party secretary of the university to oversee the merger. In 2005, the university founded Zhejiang University Holding Group, later renamed as Zhejiang University Yuanzheng Holding Group. As of 2022, there are several companies affiliated to the group have been publicly listed, including Insigma Technology, United Mechanical & Electrical, and Shenghua Land. In October 2005, the university's Hubin campus was sold at the price of 2.46 billion Chinese yuan to Kerry Properties for commercial complex development. In June 2012, Zhejiang University founded the Ocean College in collaboration with Zhoushan municipal government. In December 2014, the university signed an agreement with the University of Edinburgh to form a joint institute at the Haining campus. In July 2015, another agreement to build a joint institute was signed with the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In September 2016, the new Haining campus came into use.

In April 2013, 53 alumni co-signed a petition against the appointment of Lin Jianhua as Zhejiang University's new president. An open letter by the alumni says, "Zhejiang University needs an upright and capable academic leader, not a mediocre chief executive." In November 2013, Chu Jian, vice president of the university who was rumoured to be behind the rare petition, was arrested for bribery, yet he was not tried until 2017 and was soon released after he was sentenced to 3 years in jail which had almost been fulfilled by the time of trial.

In September 2013, amid extensive objection from local residents and university alumni, part of Huajiachi campus was sold at the price of 13.67 billion Chinese yuan, making the land the most expensive in the city's history.

In July 2020, the university came under intense criticism for allowing an ethnic minority student convicted of rape to remain enrolled. The public questioned whether the university's decision was too lenient for sexual harassments. The overwhelming public opinions made the university review the case, and eventually expelled the student.

In November 2020, the university founded its new Ningbo campus. In 2019, the Institute of Hainan were founded in Sanya, Hainan. In 2021, new institutes were founded in Quzhou, Jinhua, Wenzhou, Jiaxing, Huzhou, Shaoxing and Taizhou within Zhejiang. In March 2021, tech tycoon Colin Huang donated $100 million to support the university's Shanghai Institute for Advanced Study.

Current campuses

With seven campuses, namely Zijingang, Yuquan, Xixi, Huajiachi, Zhijiang, Zhoushan, International campus in Haining and Ningbo, Zhejiang University encompasses an area of 6.22 square kilometers with school buildings covering 3.67 million square meters of floor space.

Zijingang campus serves as the main campus of Zhejiang University and is located in the northwest of Hangzhou. There are two libraries in the campus, i.e. the Basic Library next to the east gate and the Library of Agriculture and Medicine in the southeast corner and Library of Ancient Books in the south of the campus. The first floor of the Basic Library is an English corner every Tuesday and Thursday night. The campus is served by Sanba Station and Xialongwei Station of the Hangzhou Metro to the east of the campus and Zijingang Campus Zhejiang University Station on the south side.

The South Gate of the campus is linked to the Zijingang Campus Zhejiang University station with bridges over the Yuhangtang River, which were opened in February 2022. The gigantic, five-arched South Gate was built with donations from alumni, but widely regarded unfit for the purpose among ZJU students. In a public poll in 2021, the South Gate was voted as the ugliest building in China.

Zheda Road that stretches from the main gate of the campus to the High School Attached to Zhejiang University was known for its road greening landscape design. Alongside the road is a compound named Zheda Qiushi Village, also known as Qiushi Village, which was the residential area for Zhejiang University faculty and their family. Qiushi Primary School, also known as the Primary School Attached to Zhejiang University, and Hangzhou No. 15 Middle School, also known as the Junior High School Attached to Zhejiang University, are located near the compound. The Yuquan 1897 cafe within the campus is an English corner every Wednesday evening.

Xixi campus was previously the site of the former Hangzhou University before it merged into Zhejiang University in 1998. The campus hosts Department of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences, School of Art and Archaeology, and Zhejiang University Press. The library is located in the Center of campus. Between the library and the south gate of the campus is a large meadow. The campus is next to Xuejun High School. Xuejun used to be the affiliated high school of Hangzhou University, and is among top two high schools in Hangzhou, hence a major source of students admitted into Zhejiang University. Due to the location, the university canteen at Xixi was often overloaded with high school students.

The Huajiachi campus was previously Zhejiang Agricultural University before merging with Zhejiang University and served as the old Huajiachi Campus for the National Chekiang University before the early 1950s. The campus is home to the departments of dentistry and agriculture, plus the College of Continuing Education. The Huajiachi campus is Zhejiang University's oldest campus. The Huajiachi initially refers to a lake within the campus, hence the name of the campus. The library is located on the east shore of the Huajiachi. The university made a plan to move out from the campus in 2007. As part of the plan, one fourth of the campus had been sold in 2013. In the plan, the campus will be transformed into a lakeside park that reserves most of the campus' old buildings.

The Zhijiang campus (simplified Chinese: 之江校区; traditional Chinese: 之江校區) is home to Guanghua Law School. Before being acquired by Zhejiang University in 1952, the Zhijiang campus served as the main campus of Hangchow University, and is located on the Yuelun Hill next to the Qiantang River and the Liuhe Pagoda. The campus is now home to James D. Watson Institute of Genome Sciences, Guanghua Law School and the Institute for Advanced Study in Humanities and Social Sciences. The Library of Guanghua Law School is located to the north of the Main Teaching Building. Several buildings in the campus are listed as the Major Historical and Cultural Sites Protected at the National Level. The 2010 movie Aftershock made the campus a popular tourist destination within the city, as the movie was shot on location within the campus to mimic a Chinese university life in the 1980s.

Zhoushan campus (simplified Chinese: 舟山校区; traditional Chinese: 舟山校區) is a campus that opened in 2015 and serves as the campus for the Ocean College. It is located in Lincheng, Dinghai District, Zhoushan City on the Zhoushan Island. The Library of the Ocean College is located in the north of the campus. Between the library and the south gate is a meadow. The university's only training ship, named Zijingang, is deployed at the campus. Only third-year and fourth-year undergraduate students of the Ocean College and postgraduate students studied at the campus, while first-year and second-year students of the college receive education at Zijingang before moving to the campus in their third year.

Haining International Campus (海宁国际校区) is located in the Zhejiang city of Haining. Clusters of international cooperative partners and institutions reside at this campus, which opened in 2016 as part of Zhejiang University. Student studying at the campus are also enrolled in the residential college. The first master of the college is Professor Lap-Chee Tsui. The International Campus Library is a three-storey octagonal building located on the northeast shore of the central lake of the campus. The campus is served by International Campus, ZJU station of Hangzhou–Haining intercity railway, which opened on June 28, 2021.

Zhejiang University International Business School (ZIBS), the Zhejiang University-University of Edinburgh Institute (ZJE), the Zhejiang University–University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Institute (ZJUI) and the Imperial College-Zhejiang University Joint Applied Data Science Lab are located within the campus.

The Ningbo campus was initiated as a collaboration with Ningbo city government in September 2017, with the campus' administration founded in September 2019. It was based on the campus of the former Ningbo Institute of Technology (NIT) of Zhejiang University (now NingboTech University). Zhejiang University library has not set up a branch library in the campus, yet its resources are available at NingboTech's library. The campus is served by South Higher Education Park Station of Ningbo Rail Transit. The Polytechnic Institute of Zhejiang University started a branch in the campus since October 2016. Later, the Institute of Ningbo was founded in June 2018 within the campus of Ningbo Institute of Technology (NIT), Zhejiang University. In January 2020, the NIT was made independent from Zhejiang University and renamed as NingboTech University, but remains in the campus. The campus is also home to the School of Software Technology, Zhejiang University.

Academic Structure

The academic disciplines at the university are divided into seven faculties, which each has different schools. Each faculty, school and department has its own academic committee and different rules of procedures. The committee is organized by the faculty, with a restriction on the percentage of people who serve administrative roles. Selection of the members are based on recommendations within the faculty. The university is a key comprehensive university whose fields of study cover eleven branches of learning, namely philosophy, literature, history, education, science, economics, law, management, engineering, agriculture, and medicine. Below is the list of academic faculties, schools and colleges of the university:

School of Humanities

School of International Studies

College of Media and International Culture

School of Art and Archaeology

School of Economics

Guanghua Law School

College of Education

School of Management

School of Public Affairs

School of Marxism

The Faculty of Science was a combination of the sciences departments at Hangzhou University and Zhejiang University

School of Mathematical Sciences

Department of Physics

Department of Chemistry

School of Earth Sciences

Department of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences

School of Mechanical Engineering

School of Material Science and Engineering

College of Energy Engineering

College of Electrical Engineering

College of Civil Engineering and Architecture

College of Chemical and Biological Engineering

Ocean College

School of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Department of Polymer Science and Engineering

The Faculty of Information consists of most key departments of Zhejiang University before the 1998 merger. The School of Software Technology was founded in 2001 and is located in both Hangzhou and Ningbo. Entry into the College of Computer Science and Technology is considered to be one of the most competitive in China. Its computer science department specialises in computer graphics, computer vision, and artificial intelligence, which are the computer science domains where Zhejiang University is ranked among top 5 worldwide according to CSranking. In the fourth round of CUSR, among the subjects that the faculty offers, Optical Engineering, Control Science and engineering, Computer Science and technology, and Software Engineering were rated A+, and Biomedical Engineering was rated A-.

College of Optical Science and Engineering

College of Information Science and Electronic Engineering

College of Control Science and Engineering

College of Computer Science and Technology

School of Software Technology

College of Biomedical Engineering and Instrument Science

The Faculty of Agriculture, Life and Environment Science (FALE) consists of most departments of Zhejiang Agricultural University before the 1998 merger. In the fourth round of CUSR, among the subjects that the faculty offers, Agricultural Engineering, Horticulture, Agricultural Resources and environment, and Plant protection wer rated A+, Environmental Science and Engineering, and Pharmacy were rated A, Food Science and engineering, Crop Science, Animal Science were rated A-. It has the most subjects rated A-/A/A+ across all faculties at the university.

College of Life Sciences

College of Biosystem Engineering and Food Science

College of Environmental and Resource Sciences

College of Agriculture and Biotechnology

College of Animal Sciences

The Faculty of Medicine consists of most departments of Zhejiang Medical University before the 1998 merger, with their roots dating back to Chekiang Provincial Medical School founded in 1912, the Pharmaceutical Department of National Chekiang University founded in 1944 and the Medical School of National Chekiang University founded in 1945. The faculty used to be based at Hubin Campus until it is relocated to Zijingang in 2007. The School of Medicine is also among the 45 Chinese medical schools to offer English teaching Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) programs. It also recruits medical doctoral students from prestigious Chu Kochen Honors College in a program named Ba Denian Medical Program. The School of Basic Medical Sciences offers a joint undergraduate programs in biomedicine and bioinformatics at International Campus. Under the School of Medicine, there are seven top-level hospitals. In the fourth round of CUSR, its clinical medicine, pharmacy and basic medicine are rated A+, A and A-, respectively.

College of Pharmaceutical Sciences

School of Medicine

Under the School of Medicine, there are seven affiliated hospitals, including:

First Affiliated Hospital (as the first teaching hospital)

Second Affiliated Hospital (as the second teaching hospital)

Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital (as the third teaching hospital)

Fourth Affiliated Hospital (also called Yiwu Hospital, as the fourth teaching hospital)

Women's Hospital

Children's Hospital

Stomatology Hospital (also called Zhejiang Provincial Stomatology Hospital)

Teaching and learning

The academic departments are responsible for teaching and assessments of various courses and draft the details of degree programs, which needs to be approved by the Undergraduate and Graduate Schools before start; the detailed method may differ according to the course and the program. Teaching is supervised and regulated by the Undergraduate School and the Graduate School for quality control. Chu Kochen Honors College (CKC), named after the university's former president Chu Kochen, is an elite undergraduate college of ZJU, which further select students from top students at ZJU or in Gaokao. Teaching at Chu Kochen Honors College and international dual degree programs at Haining are supervised and regulated by their own responsible committees.

Degree awarding is based on academic credits requirement for compulsory and elective courses, which a student must both fulfill to graduate. To earn academic credits, the student can choose and pass a combination of courses at his or her will, as long as the course is available for enrolment, yet some courses may be competitive for enrolment due to class size limits.

Qiushi College was founded in July 2008, as a residential college and part of the School of Undergraduate. It managed the student dormitories including the Danyang-Qingxi Hall, the Ziyun-Bifeng Hall, and the Lantian Hall. It offers liberal arts education for freshmen and supports student organizations and activities. It also provides students with aids for academic affairs such as college major choices and team building. Upon enrolment into the university, undergraduates join a hall of Qiushi College at Zijingang mostly according to their faculties of study. In the student military training and education for all Chinese national freshmen, the students are organized according to their halls within the college. In the first year of study, the major of the student may be unspecified as they are recruited according to academic faculties rather than specific academic subjects. They are considered to be a student of the Hall but not of an academic department then. The student may later apply to study a major later or transfer to another major during the study, yet the application to popular majors are highly competitive and additional requirements may apply. The college is responsible for providing assistance to the student.

Chu Kochen Honors College (CKHC) was founded in May 2000 in honour of Chu Kochen, a former president of the university and is typically chaired by the current president of Zhejiang University. Its predecessor the Mixed Class of Engineering was launched in 1984. It offers a collection of programs including the Experimental Class of Engineering, the Mixed Class, the Experimental Class of Humanities and Social Sciences, the Qiushi Sciences Class, the Experimental Class of Medicine, the Shennong Class. Entry into the college is highly selective and competitive and its selection questions are known to be creative but difficult. Notable alumni of the college include entrepreneur Colin Huang and the current president of Zhejiang University Wu Zhaohui. Its teaching and learning are supervised by a special committee headed by the president. During the program, 15–20 percentile of the CKHC students in term of GPA will be transferred to non-CKHC programs.

The dual degree programs at the International Campus are supervised and regulated by the joint institute to fulfill academic requirements of both Zhejiang University and the partner institutes. For example, the University of Edinburgh regulations on progression and degree classification also applies to its joint institute at the campus, although they are not part of Zhejiang University regulations. The campus only provides a limited number of elective courses and allows students to elect a course that is not offered at his or her own institute. However, transfer from a Sino-foreign program to a purely ZJU program or between two programs of different joint institutes are not allowed. Transfer within the joint institute is allowed, yet its approval may be subject to the class size.