On June 23, Tohoku University and the Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications held an online ceremony to renew their existing academic exchange agreement. This was the first occasion on which Tohoku University has concluded an exchange agreement entirely online.
The Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications has an outstanding record of achievements in the fields of information and communication engineering, and the university is also focusing on improving the employability of its graduates, who have been successful in finding work at major telecommunications companies and global IT companies. The two universities have interacted largely in the fields of information science and engineering. An academic agreement was concluded in 2010, and among their notable achievements in recent years, the two universities were selected to work together on a project as part of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science’s A3 Foresight Program, which brings together researchers from Japan, China, and Korea.
Five representatives from the Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, including Vice President Xu Kun and Su Fei, the Vice Dean of the School of Artificial Intelligence, took part in the ceremony. They were joined by four representatives from Tohoku University, including Vice President Masahiro Yamaguchi, Hiroo Yugami, the Dean of the Graduate School of Engineering, and Nei Kato, the Dean of the Graduate School of Information Sciences. Both sides introduced their university’s activities and their ideas for possible future exchanges.
Vice President Xu said, “We have interacted with Tohoku University at a high level for some time through joint research and student exchanges. From the perspectives of developing talented individuals, joint research, reciprocal visits, and the development of faculty, I want us to increase our exchanges”. Vice President Yamaguchi likewise expressed his high expectations, saying “I hope that the renewal of our agreement will help us to groom a new generation who will act to bring Japan and China closer in the future, and that it will also strengthen the cooperative relationship between us”.