The Qiantang tides surge as the world gathers here. On the International Campus， Zhejiang University, international exchange is simply part of daily life. Students，faculty and staff from all over the world gather here, speaking many languages and walking side by side.
From day one, the campus has followed the International Collaborative Education Model of "High-Standard and 1+X, " by partnering with world-class universities. Its mission is to nurture studentswith homeland sentiment, international vision, global competitiveness, and world responsibility. Over ten years of global engagement, the campus has grown from a blueprint into a thriving academic community. Its development reflects the effort to advance education in step with national strategies and to deliver an international education rooted in China.
One Blueprint: A Decade in Step with the Times
The campus welcomed its first cohort of students a decade ago, the same year guidelines on opening up education in the new era were issued. The guidelines called for improving the quality of joint education with overseas partners and strengthening the “Study in China” brand. This shared timeline reflects ZJU’s decision to build the campus as a key initiative supporting China’s strategy for opening up education.
“Zhejiang University has continued to refine its global engagement strategy and develop the International Campus to high standards, applying successive plans and upgrades into tangible results,” said GU Zhen, Assistant President of Zhejiang University and dean of International Campus, ZJU. “From initial concept through planning to implementation, the campus’s development as a model zone for global education partnerships has remained aligned with national strategies, turning innovative ideas into practical contributions to China’s educational opening-up.”
The campus is now home to two joint institutes: Zhejiang University–University of Edinburgh Institute (ZJE) and Zhejiang University–University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Institute (ZJUI), as well as Zhejiang University International Business School (ZIBS). These initiatives have expanded international educational partnerships, particularly in science and engineering, and strengthened the campus’s appeal as a destination for students worldwide.
Over the past decade, more than 3,600 students have graduated from the campus. Today, it enrolls over 3,300 students, with international students from 65 countries and regions accounting for 20 percent. The campus has attracted more than 10 leading scientists and scholars, including members of national academies in developed countries, as well as a faculty of more than 100 outstanding academics, over 30 percent of whom are international. It has become a strategic pillar in ZJU’s efforts to rank among the world’s leading universities and build itself into a globally outstanding, innovation-driven institution. Its educational achievements received the Special Prize of the 2021 Zhejiang Provincial Teaching Achievement Award.
One Mission: East-West Synergy in Education
The campus connects students with global education by partnering with top universities to build a curriculum that draws on Chinese and Western educational strengths, keeps up with disciplinary progress, and focuses on students’ ability development.
Since his first year, LI Xiaoman, from ZJUI’s undergraduate Class of 2026, has worked on course projects with peers from different majors. Each project, from initial ideas to practical implementation, has helped him improve his engineering skills. “Global competitiveness is more than a slogan,” LI said. “It’s something I feel in my daily studies.”
The campus combines large-class lectures with small-group discussions and peer learning, and gets students involved in hands-on research starting from their first undergraduate year. This helps them build both the ability and confidence to develop original ideas.
XUE Ziwei, from ZJE’s doctoral Class of 2026, is the campus’s first winner of ZJU’s Chu Kochen Scholarship. Working at the cross of T-cell immunology, big data, and artificial intelligence, he learned to solve research problems in a team and published papers in journals including Nature Methods and Cell Discovery. His team built the world’s first single-cell atlas of human CD8+ T cells at the million-cell scale. From undergraduate to doctoral studies, XUE has carried out interdisciplinary research at the International Campus.
XUE’s experience is just one example. The campus says nearly 30% of undergraduates publish papers in leading journals or conference proceedings during their studies. Over the past five years, its students have won 300-odd major awards in science, technology, and innovation competitions at or above the provincial and ministerial level, both in China and abroad. These achievements are backed by a consistent focus on values and character development.
▲Students and teachers devote themselves to academic research
Commitment to one’s home country lies at the heart of the campus’s educational mission, shaping its vision of whom education should serve. Throughout their studies, students are encouraged to deepen their understanding of China, build national confidence, and take responsibility for the communities they serve. An international outlook goes hand in hand with this commitment.
TANG Zhizhan, a 2021 ZJUI graduate, chose to volunteer as a teacher in western China. “Having seen different parts of the world, I wanted to bring that broader perspective to children in the mountains,” he said. GU Yashi, a 2025 ZJE PhD candidate, studies fundamental reproduction and development, as well as AI models for embryo screening. “An international outlook is not about observing the world from a distance,” she said. “It is about helping us solve real problems here in China.”
One Calling Card: A Destination for Global Youth
By linking Chinese students with the world and welcoming overseas youth, the campus keeps boosting the “Study in China” brand. In September 2026, over 220 new international students joined from 50 countries and regions, with Indonesia, Italy, Thailand, Armenia and the United States among the largest groups.
▲International students on campus.
The Master of China Studies (MCS) program was one of the campus’s earliest degree offerings. Patricio Giusto, who enrolled in 2016, was among the first 36 international students on campus. After graduation, he focused on China-related research and public outreach, writing articles or giving interviews about China more than 180 times, including 80 contributions to major Chinese media such as China Central Television, Xinhua News Agency and People’s Daily. He also founded a think tank in Argentina centered on China–Argentina strategic cooperation and serves as its executive director, while working as a policy adviser to the Argentine Senate and an associate professor at the Catholic University of Argentina. “China, and Zhejiang University in particular, gave me so much knowledge and experience,” he said. “It completely changed my life.”
The campus is building a shared framework for educating, administering and supporting both Chinese and international students. This covers recruitment, academic study, student affairs, and personal and career development. Residential colleges bring Chinese and international students together in communities with easy access to support services. Students create shared living agreements and take an active role in managing their communities. Drawing on the Fengqiao model of resolving disputes locally through dialogue and participation, this approach allows students help shape decisions, share responsibilities and address cross-cultural misunderstandings as they emerge.
Learning alongside peers from different backgrounds has also opened doors to entrepreneurship. Monish, a Malaysian member of the undergraduate Class of 2025, formed WAMECO, an interdisciplinary team of five Chinese and international students. The team won honors including second prize in a Belt and Road innovation and entrepreneurship competition for international students in China and has since moved into the Juanhu Qizhen business incubator near the campus.
Between 2024 and 2026, more than 100 young Americans visited the campus for study and exchange through programs such as the Global Classroom International Collaboration Program and Zhi-Xing China: US-China University Student Leaders Academy.
During a recent visit to the United States, President Xi Jinping announced an invitation for 100,000 young Americans to come to China for exchanges and study over the next five years. As interest in China grows among young Americans, the campus offers chances to experience the country firsthand. Bradley Max Friedman, an American graduate of Northeastern University, joined ZIBS’s MCS program in 2025. Since arriving, he has explored daily life in Haining’s local communities and visited companies in Shanghai to gain direct insights into innovation in Chinese business. “These experiences have helped me see the real China in ways that would have been difficult back in the United States,” Friedman said. At the International Campus, more young people from around the world are becoming participants in, witnesses to and storytellers of life in China.
▲Global Classroom students beside the China–U.S. Friendship Well.
One Shared Home: Fertile Ground for Global Talent
Over the past decade, the campus has built governance practices for an international community and fostered a cross-cultural exchange environment. These efforts have attracted growing numbers of early-career Chinese scholars returning from overseas and international faculty.
The campus’s Dengfeng Program supports early-career faculty development. LIU Wanlu, a tenured associate professor at ZJE, was among its first participants. After returning to China from overseas study and research, she established her career on campus and earned national recognition as an outstanding early-career researcher. Since 2019, LIU has supervised over 100 undergraduate and graduate students in interdisciplinary research at the intersection of biology and informatics. Many have received National Scholarships and published in leading journals including Cell, Science, and Nature Methods. Several have continued their studies at top universities in China and abroad, marking the rise of a new generation of ZJU scholars on campus.
International faculty also make lasting contributions. Wee-Liat ONG, a Singaporean faculty member at ZJUI, joined the campus in 2018. His course, Introduction to Computing: Engineering & Science, has enrolled over 1,300 undergraduates and been recognized as a National First-Class Undergraduate Course. ONG has also led students on community engagement visits to Tongwei County, Gansu Province, extending learning beyond the classroom to rural China. In 2024, he was named a student-favorite teacher and the campus’s first “Pioneer Scholar”. That same year, he received recognition for excellence in teaching and student development at ZJU’s 12th “Three Educations” (Teaching, Management and Service) program.
Academic career support extends to campus life and governance participation. International faculty are encouraged to serve on academic committees, join early-career faculty organizations, and take on institute management roles. The campus was the first in Zhejiang Province to launch a regular, professionally staffed bilingual mental health counseling service for international students and faculty. A bilingual online platform offers one-stop access to routine administrative services, helping newcomers to China settle in with greater confidence. Oleksiy PENKOV, a Ukrainian faculty member, has built his career and made the campus home with his family. Martin KOSAR, a Czech faculty member, actively supports student recruitment in China and overseas. Such institutional support and personalized care help scholars from diverse backgrounds build their careers and feel at home.
▲An international faculty member teaching a class.
The campus’s first decade has laid a solid foundation for supporting national priorities and regional development. These ten years mark both a milestone and a new starting point.
In 2026, a new joint program between ZJU and the Australian National University was officially approved, and the Institute of Global Development established a presence on the International Campus. These steps further strengthened the campus's international educational partnerships. In July, ZJU and the Haining municipal people’s government held a meeting on their comprehensive strategic cooperation and launched phase 2.0 of the Global Education Partnerships Model. LI Min, chief of the International Campus, ZJU, said the campus will build its global education partnerships brand around the SAIL framework: Sustainable, Accountable, International and Leading. It will continue to cultivate outstanding graduates with homeland sentiment, international vision, global competitiveness, and world responsibility. In implementing the Master Plan on Building China into a Leading Country in Education (2024–2035), the campus will contribute to China’s development as a major global education hub and to the further opening-up of education.
