On the afternoon of October 23, 2015, Ms. Jan O’Sullivan, Minister for Education and Skills of Ireland,accompanied by Mr. John Paul Kavanagh, Irish ambassador to China visited Beijing Foreign Studies University (BFSU) together with an Irish Government delegation. During the visit, Ms. O’Sullivan delivered a speech and attended the website launch ceremony of the“Irish Studies Network in China”.
Professor Han Zhen, Chairman of the University Council, BFSU, met with the delegation and signed acooperation agreement respectively with Professor Andrew J Deeks, President for UCD; and Professor Juliette Hussey, Vice President for Global Relations at Trinity College Dublin.
Professor Han Zhen said in his speech, “Ireland is a nation with a competitive advantage in higher education. University College Dublin (UCD) and Trinity College Dublin (TCD), both renowned top universities in the world, have huge potential to advance the existing partnership with BFSU. BFSU will carry out profound cooperation with Irish universities in Irish Studies, and look forward to expanding to more subjects, such as English Literature, Linguistics, International Relations, Business Studies and so on. BFSU will take measures to implement the signed agreements and to explore practical methods of new cooperation.”
Ms. O’Sullivan reviewed the great tradition of Irish Literature and its contemporary development. Shespoke highly of the contributions made by the multi-disciplinary BFSU Irish Studies Centre to promote Irish Studies in China, believing that the achievements made by Chinese and Irish scholars in academic collaborationhelped enhance mutual understanding between the two countries and promote extensive collaboration in other fields. After the speech, Ms. O’Sullivan took some questions from present students.
Following Minister O’Sullivan’s speech, the Minister spoke in relation to the website of “Irish Studies Network in China–Irish Studies Centre, BFSU”, the subproject of funding Irish Studies in BFSU, began to work and witnessed the following signing ceremony of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) of UCD with BFSU, the Memorandum of Exchange (MoE) of UCD with BFSU and the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) of TCD with BFSU. According to the MoE, the student exchange program between UCD and BFSU will be carried out from next year on. UCD will also fund faculty members in SEIS (School of English and International Studies) to visit UCD for short terms. Student exchange programs between BFSU and TCD are also in negotiation, together with cooperation agreements in such academic fields as Irish studies, Chinese studies and Asian studies.
After the ceremony, the delegation visited the Irish Studies Centre in SEIS, accompanied by Professor Wang Zhanpeng, Vice President of SEIS; Gu Jiayun, Deputy Director General of International Office; as well as some foreign experts, faculty members and postgraduates.
TCD and UCD rank respectively the first and the second best renowned universities in Ireland, and are among the leading universities in the world. The visit of the Irish educational delegation and the signing of relevant Memorandums of Cooperation will surely enhance the profound collaboration in talent training and scientific research between Irish universities and BFSU.
