On October 27, Axel Schölmerich, President of the University of Göttingen, Germany, led a delegation to visit Nanjing University. Tan Zhemin, President of NJU and Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, met with the delegation on Gulou Campus.
Tan Zhemin extended a warm welcome to the delegation and introduced the basic situation of NJU's educational development in recent years. He pointed out that the University of Göttingen is one of NJU's oldest and closest global strategic partners, and that NJU highly values cooperation with the University of Göttingen. For a long time, the two universities have carried out comprehensive, broad, and deep cooperation, establishing a solid and fruitful partnership and cultivating profound friendship. Tan expressed his hope that both sides would further deepen cooperation, relying on platforms such as the Sino-German Center for Social Computing and the Sino-German Institute for Legal Studies, to continuously strengthen academic exchanges, talent cultivation, and cultural mutual learning, jointly creating a model for Sino-German higher education exchange and cooperation, and working together to address the common challenges facing global educational reform and human development.
Axel Schölmerich expressed his appreciation for NJU's long history, excellent reputation, and outstanding achievements in talent cultivation, and fully affirmed NJU's remarkable achievements in scientific research and innovation. He emphasized that NJU is one of the University of Göttingen's most important global partners. Over the past forty years, the two universities have established a highly trustworthy cooperative relationship and continuously injected new vitality into this relationship through sustained investment and joint efforts. Facing the increasingly complex international situation, Schölmerich pointed out that continuing to promote scientific and educational cooperation has profound significance for promoting peace and development. He also introduced the latest developments in international cooperation at the University of Göttingen and expressed his willingness to further strengthen exchanges and deepen cooperation with NJU.
Tan Zhemin and Axel Schölmerich signed a new round of strategic partnership agreement and renewed four inter-university cooperation documents, including a memorandum of cooperation, a student exchange agreement, and a memorandum on joint training of law postgraduates. The attending representatives had in-depth discussions on topics such as scientific research cooperation, faculty and student exchanges, and cross-cultural research, and reached broad consensus.
During the visit, the delegation toured the former residence of John Rabe and conducted academic exchange activities with faculty and student representatives from NJU's School of Computer Science, School of Physics, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Business School, International Center for Isotope Effects Research, and the Sino-German Institute for Legal Studies at the Law School, nurturing new possibilities for future cooperation between the two universities.
The two universities first signed a strategic cooperation agreement in 2020 and have conducted substantive cooperation for over 40 years in fields such as law, computer science, business, and cross-cultural German studies. The cooperation between the two sides has become a model for high-level talent cultivation and high-level humanistic exchanges between China and Germany. This visit marks the first time the newly appointed president of the University of Göttingen has led a delegation to China.
