On November 12, 2016, Irina Georgieva Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO, visited the newly-established International Centre for Higher Education Innovation under the Auspices of UNESCO (ICHEI) at Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech). Wu Yihuan, Vice Mayor of Shenzhen; Du Yue, Secretary-General of the National Commission of the People’s Republic of China for UNESCO; Guo Yurong, Council Chairperson of SUSTech and Li Ming, Director of ICHEI accompanied Bokova. Chen Yidan, co-founder of Tencent and initiator of Tencent Foundation, Zhang Jihong, Director-General of the Shenzhen Education Bureau and council members of ICHEI were involved.

Bokova visits ICHEI

Bokova writes an inscription

The two sides exchange souvenirs

Meeting scene

In the visit, Guo and other executives of SUSTech introduced the development of SUSTech. They thanked UNESCO and Shenzhen for establishing ICHEI in SUSTech, pledging that SUSTech will fully support ICHEI and improve the quality of higher education through higher education and ICT innovation. The attendees also watched a promotional video on the educational development of SUSTech and ICHEI.

Wu Yihuan speaks

Wu welcomed Bokova. China attaches great importance to the cooperation with UNESCO, supports and takes an active part in the events organized by UNESCO, as the window and model city for China’s reform and opening-up, Shenzhen has achieved fruitful results in the close cooperation with UNESCO. Shenzhen is willing to cement exchanges with UNESCO and support ICHEI in becoming a distinctive and globally influential new institution. In the future, Shenzhen will continue to strengthen exchanges with UNESCO, and broaden the cooperation with UNESCO in the Asia Pacific, Asia and Africa, to make new contributions to human civilization and world peace, she said.

Li Ming speaks

Li reported on ICHEI’s long-term goal, latest progress and vision of the future. He thanked the National Commission of the People’s Republic of China for UNESCO, the Shenzhen Municipal People’s Government and SUSTech for their support to ICHEI construction. Ms. Bokova’s visit is of far-reaching significance and a great encouragement to ICHEI. We will continue to enhance the standardization and internationalization of ICHEI, so as to build it into a professional, high-efficiency, open and cutting-edge second-class institution, and contribute to the development of international higher education innovation. In the future, ICHEI will exploit ICTs to implement higher education cooperation programs in Asian and African developing countries, to promote educational equality and improve educational quality, he said.

Bokova speaks

Bokova extended congratulations on the establishment of ICHEI. She reviewed the persistent support of the Shenzhen Municipal People’s Government for higher education development. Higher education is vital to innovation and sustainability. UNESCO is committed to stimulating the creativity of young people and making them contribute to social development. SUSTech is a very good platform for development, in the context of the all-round scientific and cultural cooperation between Shenzhen and the world, higher education innovation will promote the innovation of young people and encourage them to fulfill their dreams in Shenzhen. UNESCO’s cooperation with 10 second-class educational institutions (including ICHEI) across the world will boost the quality of higher education and teaching, and cultivate talents for global development. We hope to work with SUSTech to build an outstanding higher education research institute and further enterprise-university-institute cooperation to make ICHEI influential worldwide. She expected ICHEI to promote the progress of higher education in developing countries under the guidance of the mission and concept of UNESCO.

Prior to the meeting, Bokova wrote an inscription for ICHEI.