U. works to establish business center in Beijing

The University is in the process of establishing an interuniversity center in Beijing to coordinate collaboration between the University and peer institutions in China, Jeremy Adelman, a history professor and director of the Council for International Teaching and Research, explained. The center, which is expected to open this fall, will continue the University’s efforts to promote international teaching and research initiatives.

Over the past year, the University has finalized three strategic partnerships — with Humboldt University in Berlin, the University of Sao Paulo and the University of Tokyo — in an effort to improve the University’s global presence and encourage cross-national collaboration among students and faculty. The interuniversity center in Beijing will serve a similar purpose by facilitating interdisciplinary research and teaching between the University and leading Chinese institutions, including Fudan University in Shanghai and Tsinghua University in Beijing.

“[The center’s] primary functions are facilitative,” Adelman said. “That is to say, to help facilitate programs that we want to create for Princeton students in China and for constituents in China who are collaborating with people at Princeton.”

Vice Provost for International Initiatives Diana Davies said that the center’s main function will be to strengthen some of the programs that the University already has in place in China. For example, Davies said the center may assist in hiring teachers for the Princeton in Beijing intensive summer language program, as well as help with renting dormitory space for visiting undergraduates.

The center, which is affiliated with Tsinghua University, will be located in a building on the outskirts of Tsinghua’s campus in Beijing. According to Adelman, the University will temporarily lease two offices and a seminar room until the center is permanently relocated to a new building where all of Tsinghua’s international partners will be hosted.

According to Adelman, the interuniversity center is the most cost-effective way for Princeton to establish a legal presence in China.

“Princeton, in order to enhance its profile in China and promote its programs at a greater scale and quality that we want to pursue, needs to have legal standing in China,” Adelman said. While the center will act as a “semi-independent unit,” Tsinghua will be able to assist with any legal or monetary arrangements necessary for the University’s programs in Beijing and elsewhere in China, he said.

According to Davies, the center will be instrumental in coordinating efforts between faculty and graduate students wishing to conduct research abroad. Specifically, she said the center will assist faculty in hiring research assistants, help pay teachers and visiting lecturers and direct graduate students to housing facilities as well as local libraries and archives.

In addition, the center will coordinate legal affairs such as handling the shipment of materials and ensuring that faculty members follow the rules of export controls.

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While the center will help to strengthen the University’s ties with peer institutions abroad, it does not serve the same function as a strategic partnership like those in Tokyo or Berlin. Davies explained that the large number of exceptional Chinese institutions made it difficult for the University to select just one institution with which to partner.

“If you look at how we picked our strategic partners so far, those were cases where certain universities just kept popping up,” Davies said. “In China, there are a variety of universities with very particular strengths in certain areas.”

Davies added that while faculty from a variety of departments seem to have close ties to the University of Tokyo or Humboldt University, each Chinese institution is known for a certain area or discipline. According to Davies, the interuniversity center makes the most sense for China because it allows the University to strengthen and maintain its relationships with a variety of institutions.

“This may be in some ways, and in some very specific cases, an alternative to the strategic partner,” she said.

Adelman said that the future of the center will be largely determined by how departments and programs at the University want to scale up in China. Adelman added that the center will allow programs like the East Asian Studies department to expand its Chinese language options or offer new global seminars in Beijing.

The center is currently being funded by central University funds, according to Davies. Although Davies said alumni support is welcome, the University does not yet have plans to ask for donations specific to the center.