Founded in 1897, Zhejiang University is one of the earliest institutions of higher learning in China. Through over a century’s development, the University is now a well-known comprehensive research institution.
A research institution of higher learning under the direct administration of China’s Ministry of Education, Zhejiang University boasts a full range of academic studies. It has now 39 post-doctoral programs, 278 doctoral programs and 115 specialties for undergraduate studies in 11 branches of learning, namely philosophy, literature, history, education, science, economics, law, management, engineering, agriculture and medicine. The university now has 13 national key laboratories, 5 national engineering (technology) research centers, 3 national research bases in humanities and social sciences.
Zhejiang University has a strong teaching and research staff. There are 14 members of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, 9 members of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, over 1,200 full professors and 2,400 associate professors working full time in the 23 schools of the university, and the number of its full-time students has now reached over 40,000, including over 15,000 master-degree students and PhD candidates, 13,600 undergraduate students and 1,400 international students. In addition, the university has nearly 54,000 students working in various programs of distance learning and continuing education. The university now has academic links with more than 100 universities in 30 countries and regions. Each year over 430 long-term or short-term foreign teachers and experts come to teach or conduct cooperative research.
The University is well equipped with teaching and research facilities. It has the largest library of its kind in China with a total collection of 6,000,000 volumes. In addition, the library has introduced over 236 electronic databases of 56 kinds in all disciplines, including over 9,000 full-text journals and 100,000 e-books in different languages. The “China-US Million Book Digital Library Project”, which is to digitalize over one million Chinese and English books, will be completed in July 2006 with the University playing the leading part.
As one of the top-notch universities in China that have been given top priority for development by governments, central and local alike, Zhejiang University has been making all efforts to develop itself into a world-class institution of higher learning, making even greater contributions to social progress and economic development of China and the world.