CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Huazhong University of Science & Technology (HUST) on Tuesday, Sept. 24.
The MOU is between the Grainger College of Engineering at Illinois and the School of Mechanical Science and Engineering at HUST. It was signed following a meeting between a 10-person delegation from HUST that included Zhang Guangjun, Chair of the University Committee at HUST, and Illinois Provost John Coleman; Reitumetse Mabokela, associate chancellor and vice provost for global affairs and strategies at Illinois International; Philippe Geubelle, executive associate dean of Grainger; and Anthony Jacobi, head of the Department of Mechanical Science and Engineering at Illinois.
The Global Relations team at Illinois International organized the visit and coordinated the signing ceremony between the two institutions. This is the first MOU ceremony Global Relations hosted this semester.
The memorandum’s purpose is to expand current collaborations by focusing on establishing a Cooperative Education Program agreement and looking at the development of a potential summer academic program.
Additionally, Guangjun said they are interested in expanding collaboration in different areas outside of mechanical science and engineering such as clean energy and medicine. Jie Chen, the director of the Office of International Affairs at HUST, translated for Guangjun.
Guangjun said his visit to Illinois was his first outbound visit to a partner institution after stepping into his current role as chair of the university committee at HUST nearly 10 months ago.
He said strengthening the relationship between both universities is a top priority.
“I think the people-to-people exchange and all the communication among scholars and students is very important and it is only in this way that together we will promote the high-quality talent education as well as the progress of human civilization,” Guangjun said.
Coleman said that part of Illinois’ mission is to provide students with transformative learning experiences and one way they accomplish this mission is through partnerships with collaborators like HUST.
Analicia Haynes is the storyteller and social media specialist for Illinois International. She can be reached at ahayn2@illinois.edu.