News & Events

Date: 2023-05-17 11:38丨 Source: official account of Yuanpei College of Peking University丨 Author:

Editor's note

On May 13th, the preparatory meeting for the "Community of Chinese University Academies" was held online, and Yao Fei, Vice Dean of Liberal Arts College, Chongqing University delivered a speech on behalf of Liberal Arts College. Here is the speech.

Thanks for Dean Li Meng of Yuanpei College, Peking University for the kind invitation, and thank all colleagues for coming to participate in this conference to discuss the academy system reform.

Chongqing University is currently implementing the academy system reform in accordance with national policy and has established three important academies. The Liberal Arts College and Liberal Arts Academy of Chongqing University play significant roles in this reform. The Liberal Arts College and Chongqing University Institute of Humanities and Social Sciences for Advanced Study are “two institutions under one brand,” responsible for developing humanities disciplines such as the studies of literature, history, and philosophy at Chongqing University. We are also highly devoted in teaching. These institutions were established after President Lin Jianhua arrived at Chongqing University in 2011. Over the years, the Liberal Arts College has grown into a college with over 60 full-time teachers and recruits a yearly cohort of over 60 students majoring in literature, history, and philosophy. Freshman and sophomore students take classes in all three directions, and in students declare their major in their third year.

The Liberal Arts College has celebrated its 11th anniversary and we have gained valuable insights from our peers across the country. In the process of reforming the academy system, we hope to receive support from other colleges and universities nationwide. We are eager to collaborate with these institutions under the new reform of the academy system to explore important issues in our future teaching and researching endeavors.

While the College draws on the concept of "liberal arts education", which aims to offer broad-based, small-scale, and high-quality undergraduate education, it also inherits the tradition of classical "academy" education in China. Taking reading great books as the method, we aim to break down barriers between disciplines to cultivate outstanding talents in the liberal arts who understand the ancient and the modern, the Chinese tradition and the Western world. We aim to build the best base for liberal arts education in China and the best liberal arts program for talents in the humanities in western China.