Sichuan University

Old gate of the National Sichuan University

Sichuan University is one of the earliest institutions of higher education in China. Its earliest predecessor was the Sichuan Chinese and Western School (四川中西學堂), a school established in 1896 that combined traditional and modern methods of education. In 1902, it was merged with two traditional Chinese academies, the Jinjiang Shuyuan (錦江書院, founded 1740) and the Zunjing Shuyuan (尊經書院, founded 1875), and became known as the Sichuan Higher School (四川高等学堂, later 四川高等学校). In 1916, after another merger with a normal school, it was renamed the National Chengdu Higher Normal School (國立成都高等師範學校). In the late 1920s, the institution was briefly divided into three universities, namely the National Chengdu University, the Chengdu Normal University and the Public Sichuan University. In 1931, however, they were reintegrated to form the National Sichuan University (國立四川大學). By 1949, the National Sichuan University had been developed into one of the largest multidisciplinary universities in China, with arts, science, engineering, agriculture, law, and normal schools and a total of 25 departments.

After the foundation of the PRC, the name was changed to Sichuan University. In the 1950s, the national "adjustment of colleges and departments" (院系调整) was organized, after which SCU specialized in arts and science. The schools of engineering and agriculture was mostly split off to form two new universities: the Chengdu Institute of Technology (成都工学院) and the Sichuan Institute of Agriculture. The normal school was merged into Southwest Normal University and Sichuan Teachers College. The school of law became part of the Southwest College of Political Science and Law. A number of departments in agriculture was transferred to the Southwest Institute of Agriculture, while the department of aeronautics was affliated under the Beijing Institute of Aeronautics.

the north gate of Wangjiang Campus of SCU, taken on 17, Oct 2015

The Chengdu Institute of Technology, established in 1954, specialized in chemical engineering, hydroelectricity, mechanics, textiles, and light industry. In 1978, it was renamed to Chengdu University of Science and Technology (CUST).

The West China School of Medicine was originally founded as a private medical school, known as West China Union College (Chinese: 華西協和大學). It became a public university after the foundation of the PRC, being renamed to Sichuan Medical College in 1953 and West China University of Medical Science (WCUMS) in 1985. It was established in 1910 by five Christian missionary groups from the U.S., UK and Canada, with offered courses in stomatology, biomedicine, basic medicine and clinical medicine. By the 1990s, It had become one of the most reputable Chinese medical institutions at home and abroad.

In 1994, the SCU, CUST and WCUMS merged to form the Sichuan Union University (四川联合大学). The university adopted the current name in 1998.

Today, Sichuan University is the largest and most comprehensive university in Western China. SCU grants doctorates in twelve main disciplines and 111 subordinate disciplines. It also has six professional degree programs, and has 16 disciplines for postdoctoral research. The 109 bachelor's degree programs SCU grants cover the main fields in liberal arts, sciences, engineering, medicine and agriculture. Its current student population is more than 70,000.

Sichuan University has a current total staff of 11,357, among which 1,323 are professors, 2,345 associate professors, 13 academicians of Chinese Academy of Sciences and Chinese Academy of Engineering, 434 tutors of doctoral students, and 17 members of the Academic Degrees Committee and the Discipline Appraisal Group under the State Council. SCU has 23 professorships from the Yangtze River Scholar Award Plan (9 lecture professor).

Jiang'an Campus of Sichuan University. The Ming-yuan Lake, the 1st teaching building, and the Jiang'an Library of SCU around it can be seen in the photo.

Sichuan University has two national key labs, six national engineering centers, five ministerial (MOE) key labs, 35 provincial key labs, 10 ministerial and provincial centers, four key research bases for humanities and social sciences, and four clinical research bases at the national level. The university has invested significantly in research, teaching and medical equipment, with a total value of about 530 million RMB.

SCU has undertaken and completed a number of national, ministerial and regional research projects, and has many achievements that are rated first class in China. The university publishes more than 4,000 research papers annually.

In 2002, the university's state and central government funding ranked fifth among Chinese universities; it was ranked seventh for the number of publications and eleventh for publications included in SCI. The citations ranked fifteenth among Chinese universities. The number of publications in science, engineering and medicine ranked sixth, and the citations ranked seventh among Chinese universities. In 2002, the university applied for 121 patents, 102 out of which were invention-oriented, making it number eighth among peer schools.

Central atrium of the engineering library on the Wangjiang campus, July 2013

The university has four libraries containing ca. 5.5 million volumes in total.[10] The libraries also serve as the Collection Center for English Publications under the National Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, Ministry of Education Information Center for Liberal Arts Literature and CALIS Southwest Sub-center.[11] The National University Scientific and Technological Projects and Achievements Consulting Center, and Center for Medical Literature Retrieval in Southwest China are served by the SCU library as well.

The university museum is the only one of its kind in China with a comprehensive collection of over 40,000 cultural relics, and over 600,000 animal and plant specimens, ranking first in its holdings among the others in China.[12][13]

The university stadium is fully equipped and served as the main field for the Sixth National Collegiate Sports Meet. Other facilities available include a campus web center, an analytic and testing center, university archives,[14] the university press, a national foreign language examination center and intensive language training center, four attached hospitals, and one attached health school. The university publishes 37 academic periodicals for domestic and overseas audience.

Sichuan University's three campuses are located in Chengdu, the capital city of Sichuan Province. The older Wangjiang (望江) campus is in central Chengdu, adjacent to the Jinjiang River and its tributary the Jiang'an River. The nearby Huaxi (华西) campus is the site of the medical school. The Jiang'an (江安) campus was built in 2003 in Shuangliu County about 12.5 km away from the older campuses; it covers an area of about 4.7 km² and has total floorage of more than 2.7 million m². New attending students (most of them) will spend their first and second year in Jiang'an Campus (the newest campus) and then moving to Wangjiang campus for the rest of their college years.

The University has over 30 colleges or schools in various disciplines, including:[15]

• Wu Yuzhang Honors College, the elite undergraduate college of Sichuan University. Each year, only about 1.5% freshmen from various L&S and Engineering majors of Sichuan University will be able to join Wu Yuzhang Honors College.
• College of Physical Science and Technology

  The College of Physical Science and Technology is located in Wangjiang Campus. The Department of Physics was established in 1928. There are two key national disciplines: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Nuclear Technology. Other study areas include Optics and Condensate Matter Theory. Condensate Matter physics carries out its research in the microscopic electron transportation lab.

• College of Arts
• College of Foreign Languages and Cultures
• College of Mathematics
• College of Computer Science
• College of Software Engineering
• College of Electrical Engineering
• College of Electronics and Information Engineering
• School of Chemical Engineering
• School of Pharmacy
• West China College of Stomatology, which was the earliest hospital of stomatology and had a significant role in the development of modern stomatology[16] in China. A dental clinic called Renji Dental Clinic was founded in 1907, and was expanded to the first dental hospital in China in 1912. In 1917 the medical faculty of West China Union University (WCUU) established a department of dentistry, which in 1921 became the school of dentistry of WCUU. It was renamed as Hospital of Stomatology, Sichuan Medical College in 1953. It was renamed as the School of Stomatology, West China University of Medical Sciences in 1985 and as the West China College of Stomatology, Sichuan University in 2000.
• Institute of Semiotics and Media Studies (ISMS), founded in 2006 by Professor Henry (Yiheng) Zhao. The ISMS has research focused on the semiotics of video games, brand, fashion, tourism, gift, celebrities and other topics of popular culture. Interdisciplinary studies integrating semiotics with Marxism, psychoanalysis, gender studies phenomenology, existentialism, hermeneutics, and post-modernism have been an ISMS focus.
• West China Medical Center of Sichuan University.
• Sichuan University-the Hong Kong Polytechnic University Institute for Disaster Management and Reconstruction
• Sichuan University - Pittsburgh University Institute, a new academic entity jointly established by Sichuan University and the University of Pittsburgh.

Zhang Lan, social activist, educationist, and former Vice-Chairman of the Chinese Central Government, and Wu Yuzhang, revolutionary and educationist, were once the President of the university. Other notable people who studied at SCU include Marshal Zhu De, one of the founding fathers of the People's Republic of China and the People's Liberation Army, Guo Moruo, a literary expert and previous president of Chinese Academy of Science, Jinde Cao, Dean of the School of Mathematics at Southeast University,[17] and Ba Jin, a well-known Chinese author.

Other notable people include:

• Yang Shangkun (杨尚昆)
• Feng Youlan (冯友兰)
• Tong Dizhou (童第周)
• Zhu Guangqian (朱光潜)
• Ke Zhao (柯召)
• Pu Baoming (蒲保明)
• Song Yonghua (宋永華)

• List of universities in China
• West China Union University

• Sichuan University website (in Chinese)
• Sichuan University website