On May 8, Professor Zhang Yanduo, Deputy Secretary of the University Party Committee and President, paid separate visits to the School of Management and the School of Foreign Languages for research and guidance, accompanied by Dan Jien, Director of the Party and Government Office.

Zhang Yanduo closely reviewed the work report of the School of Management, fully recognized its achievements in recent years, conducted an in-depth analysis of the opportunities and challenges confronting its current development, and offered clear insights on refining distinctive and competitive disciplinary directions. He emphasized that macro planning is critical to the school’s high-quality development, stressing the need to consolidate the central role of discipline construction from a strategic standpoint. He urged increased learning, experience-sharing and exploration to swiftly identify development directions aligned with academic frontiers and national priorities. He added that disciplinary teams should be built around these directions, noting that weak foundations are not a barrier to success—steadfast commitment and sustained efforts will yield results. He highlighted that in the age of artificial intelligence, disciplinary directions must both align with mainstream trends and develop unique features. Taking the development of high-cohesion, interdisciplinary research teams as the starting point, he called for continuous optimization of graduate training and research platform directions. He proposed building a “four-in-one” development framework—integrating disciplinary directions, team research focuses, graduate training orientations and research platform priorities—to foster synergy and gain an early advantage in discipline construction.

Members of the School of Management’s leadership team and assistant deans attended the research seminar, chaired by Zuo Hui, Secretary of the Party Committee. At the meeting, Yan Huafei, representing the college leadership, delivered a report on the school’s basic background, development goals, existing shortcomings and future plans. He also provided details on the progress of flagship initiatives and key tasks for 2025, and highlighted the challenges and issues confronting the school’s development.

Zhang Yanduo fully recognized the progress achieved by the School of Foreign Languages in its development and construction, and outlined three key suggestions for scientific college management and academic development. First, prioritize discipline and program building. Sustained efforts should be focused on key areas including talent recruitment, teaching reform, research output cultivation, enrollment and employment, and international cooperation. This will strengthen disciplines and programs, provide solid support for enhancing talent training quality, and drive the school’s high-quality development. Second, enhance the teaching quality of public basic courses. The school undertakes a substantial number of university-wide public basic courses, making significant contributions to supporting student training across all majors. As circumstances evolve, reforms and innovations in public basic course teaching are imperative to meet new demands in higher education talent training. This requires continuous optimization of teaching philosophies, methods and content to fully exert the fundamental role of public basic courses in talent development. Third, leverage artificial intelligence to empower education and teaching. Artificial intelligence currently exerts a direct impact on the development of language disciplines and majors, with the emergence of various language model tools bringing both challenges and opportunities to teaching. While addressing challenges head-on, efforts should be made to seize opportunities—using AI to enhance teaching effectiveness, closely following the direction and trends of educational digitalization, and enabling education and teaching to unleash new vitality by leveraging AI technological advantages.

The School of Foreign Languages’ research seminar took place in Conference Room 308, chaired by Wang Huoli, Secretary of the school’s Party Committee. Attendees included members of the leadership team, assistant deans, the head of the E+ Experimental Zone and directors of all teaching and research sections. Professor Chen Mingfang, Dean of the school, outlined its basic background and reported on the progress of annual flagship projects and key tasks, as well as future work plans, covering areas such as party building and school governance, education and teaching, scientific research, discipline development, and talent recruitment and cultivation. The meeting featured a lively atmosphere, with in-depth discussions among participants on talent training, teaching reform and the internationalization of education.