The University of California in China
John Jamieson, EAP Study Center Director, Shanghai
Professor Emeritus, East Asian Languages and Cultures, UC Berkeley
Author with UC students at the opening of the California House in Shanghai
Q. Could you tell us something about UC and EAP’s China background leading up to the June 2006 opening of a California House in Shanghai, presided over by then Executive Vice President Rory Hume?
A. Of course. The University of California’s vision of the study of Chinese culture and civilization as forming a central part of its education and research mission goes back to its founding period in the 1860s and establishment of UC’s first endowed chair, the Agassiz Professorship in Oriental Languages. Later decades saw formation of world-leading faculties in Asian studies on nearly all of our campuses, a long and important story that has yet to be written. EAP’s China presence is shorter and simpler. Programs in Hong Kong and Taiwan began in the 1970s and remain attractive to students. The first Mainland China Study Center was created at Peking University in 1986, expanding from about ten UC student participants to over 150 now. Programs there are primarily a combination of language and Chinese culture and civilization studies, and have grown to encompass work at a second partner institution, Beijing Normal University. Shanghai only recently entered the EAP orbit. I came here in VERIP III retirement and for personal reasons in 2003, and was asked to explore both creation of study programs and the feasibility of forming a larger UC structure that would include graduate study, joint research, alumni activities, and the like. That work resulted first in affiliation with East China Normal University (beginning in 2003) for intensive Chinese language study, then a series of new English medium and topically focused curricula with Fudan University (beginning in 2004). Our numbers grew again from about a dozen UC student participants at the beginning to nearly 200 now, in just three years of growth.
Q. Can you tell us more about the Fudan programs?
A. I’ve worked with a number of universities in China and can say unequivocally that Fudan has been the most congenial and academically dynamic. We approached them first with a proposal to create a series of courses under a Business and Economics rubric that would be taught in English, in return for reciprocal slots in the UC system for Fudan undergraduates on a student-per-term parity basis. It was quickly accepted. Fudan professors selected for our courses are leaders in their fields, including Professor Zhou Dunren, former Vice-Director of Fudan’s Center for American Studies and a prominent analyst of US and Chinese economic and social issues, and Professor Zhang Jun, the widely published Director at the China Center for Economic Studies (CCES) at Fudan University. The Business and Economics program is offered in the spring semester. In the fall we offer the Joint Program in International Studies, currently with a core series of courses examining problems in globalization, including an overview of the phenomenon, political issues, and economic issues. Both UC and Fudan students take the courses, which are jointly taught by one or more UC faculty and one or more Fudan professors. Again, we have been most fortunate in enlisting top scholars for these offerings, an example being Chinese American Relations and the Rise of Asia, taught by Professors Wu Xingbo (Deputy Director of Fudan’s Center for American Studies and Associate Dean of Fudan’s School of International Relations and Public Affairs) and Lowell Dittmer (UC Berkeley Political Science and Editor of the academic journal Asian Survey).
Currently 63 UC students are enrolled in this program. It was fortuitous that we approached Fudan at a time when they were anxious to add a significant number of English-taught courses to their own general offerings—an objective not Fudan’s alone, to be sure, but one that Fudan has taken seriously. Our work with them has thus served as a catalyst to the point that Fudan University now offers more English medium courses, for which their own students gain full credit, than any other top research university in China. Further, Fudan embraced reciprocity for their undergraduates immediately, which is unusual for Chinese research universities. They remain the only Mainland China partner with whom we have a student exchange in both name and substance. I meet with their reciprocity students on their return and sense strongly the affinity they have with UC as well as their firm goal to return for graduate study. Rich and long-term value is thereby added to both our universities and countries.
Q. Now that the California House is up and running after, we understand, quite a gestation period, what shape is it taking?
A. It did take a while from conception to development to execution, but not all that long in the university context. UC has had physical presences in two countries, the United Kingdom and Mexico, which serve as hubs for intellectual interaction with those cultures. The decision to add a third location in China recognized its importance in all walks of life, whether they are cultural, social, or economic, as well as in research and education. It addressed the need to more assertively integrate China into the lives of the California citizenry and into work that addresses our common challenges. The result is a modest, 100m2 suite of offices in the northeastern, Yangpu District of Shanghai where nine or ten research and higher education institutes are concentrated, including Fudan University and Tongji University. Abutting us is another 100m2 of space that will be occupied by the UCLA US-China Institute of Economic Policy and Business, a project that will analyze and study economic and business problems in the US-China relationship, issues that need careful analysis by both sides to increase mutual understanding and decrease uninformed contention. Through this joint and near simultaneous action, UC’s profile in Shanghai and China has been significantly heightened. The California House scope of operations includes facilitating joint research between UC and Chinese universities, maintaining a database of UC-China research, and serving as a venue for seminars, conferences, and lectures. It will also be responsible for alumni affairs and the exploration of possibilities for UC curricular programs in China. At the same time it is home to the Shanghai Study Center and student exchanges under bilateral agreements with Chinese universities. We see this developing into a lively center for the exchange of ideas and a magnet for the establishment of future UC research presences, of which the UCLA US-China Institute of Economic Policy and Business is but the first example.
Q. Professor John Marcum, recently retired Director of the University of California Education Abroad Program, had a vision for EAP that he termed “beyond EAP.” In his vision the Study Centers abroad, led by UC faculty, serve as platforms for advancing a more comprehensive university strategy for internationalization—one that builds on and transcends a student exchange program. These endeavors, led by the Office of International Academic Activities (OIAA), resulted in the OIAA London, Mexico, and now Shanghai “Houses” to facilitate institutional relationships. Would you comment on the development of the EAP and OIAA programs in Shanghai, current programs or initiatives catalyzed by the Shanghai platform, and how the University of California might benefit from this new platform?
A. I haven’t mentioned John Marcum in this conversation and must. He and his very wise lieutenant, the late Dr. Peter Wollitzer, were the perpetrators of Shanghai development who sought my involvement in the first place and offered sage counsel and support throughout. You can observe in responses to your early questions, at nearly every point, John’s concept translated into action. My position in Shanghai in a way is peculiar in that it directs the OIAA California House under the Office of the President and the Study Center under EAP. It may end up being sui generis. Yet in another way it is not at all peculiar but rather a very natural interdependency, neither independently nor exclusively EAP or OIAA. There is a strong argument for the two remaining as one. The next logical step in our curricular building together with Fudan, for example, is graduate study where several ideas are being explored. And graduate study could very well be part of larger collaborative China-UC research projects that the California House could assist in building and provide logistical support for traffic to and from UC. In our California House office building, one itself focused on lessees in the business of innovation, we have access to a general auditorium that accommodates 200-plus participants and a smaller, 30-person-sized conference space that is part of the UCLA Institute with which we work cooperatively. Capacity is available, therefore, for all-China meetings of collaborative research networks built by UC colleagues and their Chinese counterparts. We are in the process of exploring hosting one such meeting in the near future. These are all examples of the catalysis and institutional relationship-building potential that California House has to offer. We are very much in our infancy and already nurturing such developments. Having an infrastructure and an ongoing role in China’s research and education permits an invaluable sense and grasp of trends and opportunities in this rapidly changing university environment. Perhaps this offers illustration that John’s foresight, surely insofar as China is concerned, was 20/20. I see future potential here as huge.
Please urge students interested in EAP’s programs in China to explore the EAP website before the upcoming application deadline.