As follow-up of the UT-BMS delegation’s (Prof. dr. Rez Kabir, Dr. Xiaohong Huang and Dr. Liqin Brouwers-Ren) visit to the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) in Mid-December 2016, two colleagues from the School of Management of USTC, Prof. dr. LU Wei (Assistant to the Dean in International Affairs) and Prof. dr. XU Yi (Education Director MBA) paid a return visit to the UT on 7 February 2017. Both sides agreed on staff exchange and student exchange as the start of bi-lateral faculty cooperation.
Prof. dr. Petra de Weerd-Nederhof, Education Director Business Administration programme, hosted the talk with the USTC delegation in Management. Currently The School of Management of USTC runs a “1+2+1+1” bachelor-master programme, by sending their senior bachelor students studying 1 year in Taiwan (kind of pre-master) and the final year of master’s study in the United States. After Prof. de Weerd-Nederhof’s introduction about the MSc BA programme of BMS faculty and its double degree programme with TU Berlin, the USTC delegation found the UT-BMS 1-year master programme quite attractive and competitive, and is therefore willing to recommend the USTC students to do the final year of their “1+2+1+1” study also in Twente. Besides, the School of Management of USTC hopes to invite one or two BMS teachers to give short time teaching to their students at their school. The USTC delegation also offered scholarship possibilities for the UT students, who wish to take a few courses, or even obtain a degree, at USTC.
Left to right: Xiaohong Huang (UT), André Veenendaal (UT), XU Yi (USTC), Petra de Weerd-Nederhof (UT), LU Wei (USTC), Liqin Brouwers-Ren (UT)
Earlier on that day, the USTC professors were introduced to Hanna Lange, International Affairs officer of the UT S&B department, and later they discussed with the BMS faculty Coordinator Internationalization Inge van Haare and Exchange officer Laura Klaver for a bi-lateral faculty exchange agreement.
USTC is UT’s China strategic partner. Under the umbrella of UT’s MoU with USTC, almost all other UT faculties have conducted regular staff collaboration and student exchange activities with their USTC counterparts. UT also encourages the expansion of collaboration to the non-technical faculty BMS with its USTC counterpart, hence the talk between the BMS Education Director and the USTC delegation in Management fits in this UT policy.
The first exchange of staff and students is expected to take place in the academic year 2017-2018.
