The second change rolled out between the 1990s and the dawn of the 21st century. Multidisciplinary, comprehensive, and research-based universities were established, which entailed adjustments to faculties nationwide, and restructuring of China’s education system. Government-administered public universities and private universities supplement each other in this new model.

Zhang Xinsheng added, “You can see that during the adjustments of faculties in the 1950s, the development of higher education presented regional international features. It cannot be called globalized education. The international strategies applied by universities today are not far from it.”

A Solid Foundation for Globalization

Tsinghua University(THU) with its 100-year history has an auditorium which resembles the one at the University of Virginia. After visiting Tsinghua in November 1920, Bertrand Russell described it as a “transplanted” American entity. Shi Jinghuan, executive vice dean of the Institute of Education of Tsinghua University, admitted that from the start Tsinghua was established under strong international influences. From the 1900s to the 1950s, it learnt from the conduct of higher education institutions in the U.S. Later, under the influence of the Soviet Union and subsequent adjustments, it became an engineering university. In the mid-1990s, it set itself the ambitious goal of becoming one of the world’s top universities, and is exploring ways to achieve this goal.

Tsinghua University is the Harvard of China. It enjoys an excellent reputation academically. Its graduates are (were) in important positions in China. For instance, nine graduates are (were) members of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee; 14 graduates are (were) members of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, 50 graduates are (were) members of the CPC Central Committee; 400 graduates are (were) provincial and ministerial officials. Out of the 14 winners of Top Science Awards, six were graduates from Tsinghua, and among the 1,141 academicians in the Chinese Academy of Sciences, 306 were its alumni, accounting for 26.82 percent; among the 831 academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, 146 or 17.57 percent, were from Tsinghua, and among its graduates are 14 people holding academician titles in both academies. Shiing-Shen Chern, Chia-Chiao Lin, Chen-Ning Yang, Tsung-Dao Lee, Andrew Chi-Chih Yao and other world-renowned experts also graduated from this university. In today’s competitive society six or seven million college graduates are passed over every year by potential employers, but Tsinghua graduates are surely not among them.

Funding for scientific research in Tsinghua reached RMB 2.445 billion in 2009, exceeding all other universities on China’s mainland. Innovative platforms were created to cover different disciplines, including the national laboratory of information technology presently under construction, 12 national key laboratories, six research centers of engineering technologies, three engineering laboratories, 16 key laboratories under the Ministry of Education, and some 30 scientific research institutes approved by other ministries. Furthermore, there are 70 Tsinghua-established scientific research institutes and 85 joint research institutes established with Chinese and foreign enterprises.

By making pubic application and engaging in competitions, university professors can acquire research projects and funding from the Ministry of Science and Technology, National Natural Science Foundation of China, and industrial and military departments of government as well. Correspondingly, the professors can cooperate with companies and non-governmental organizations to secure research funds. The average ratio of public to private funding is one to one, but it varies across universities. According to the Ministry of Education, in 2009, the total amount of money universities collected via all channels for their scientific research reached RMB 72.8 billion, with some universities gleaning up to RMB 1.2 billion, equal to the average of U.S. universities under the AAU (the Association of American Universities), and the Group of Eight (the coalition of eight leading Australian universities).

According to a report released this year by the Royal Society of the United Kingdom, the U.S. topped the world in the number of papers on scientific research but was on a downward trend proportionately, while China upped its proportion to 10.2 percent from the previous 4.4 percent, ranking second after surpassing the U.K., Japan, Germany and France.

The Times Higher Education Supplement in the U.K. released the World University Reputation Rankings of 2011, and Tsinghua and Peking universities in China ranked 35 and 43 respectively. The annual rankings employ 13 separate performance indicators. Besides teaching and research, the indicators include citations, industry income and degree of internationalization.

As Wu Guilong, deputy director of the Department of Science and Technology of the Ministry of Education, pointed out, there are five modes by which Chinese universities can join in international technology research. The first is cooperative projects between governments. After signing a bilateral or multilateral agreement under the national framework agreement on technological research cooperation, the university will receive funding from the government. The Chinese government set up a key projects model for these ventures during the 10th Five-year Plan period (2001-2005).

The second mode is the Megascience Engineering Mode. Chinese universities have participated in the European Nuclear Program, the Accelerator Program, and the Ocean Drilling Program.

The third mode is joint establishment of research institutes. All leading transnational corporations have set up research institutions in Chinese universities. The Chinese government encourages universities to set up joint research institutes with foreign universities, research institutions or enterprises.