East China Normal University

East China Normal University traces its roots to the formation of St. John's College (later to become St. John's University) in 1879, and its heritage has had a deep influence in the development of Chinese modern higher education.[2]

In 1879, St. John's College was founded by William Jones Boone and Joseph Schereschewsky, Bishop of Shanghai, by combining two pre-existing Anglican colleges in Shanghai. In 1905, the college became St. John's University and was registered in Washington D.C. in the United States. It was the first institution to grant bachelor's degrees in China, starting in 1907.

After the May Thirtieth Movement in 1925, some academics and students left the St. John's University, later forming the private Kwang Hua University to support the labor and anti-imperialist movement during the middle period of the Republic of China era.

In 1924, after a student protest at the Xiamen University in Fujian some academics fled north to Shanghai, where they established what became the Great China University (also known as Daxia University).

Siqun Auditorium built in 1946, named in memory of Wang Boqun, former president of the Great China University and the first Minister of Communications.

After the founding of the People's Republic of China, East China Normal University was officially formed in 1951 by the merger of the Great China University and the Kwang Hua University, and was joined at the same time by a number of faculty members from Fudan University, Tongji University, University of Shanghai and East China PE Academy, making it the first national teacher’s training university of the People's Republic of China. This was done in part due to the government's desire to pool these institutions' resources into a single, stronger entity, cultivate talents with professional knowledge, and promote the development of education in the country.

In the 1950s, the Chinese government regrouped the country's higher education institutions in an attempt to build a Soviet-style system. Under this policy, most of the faculties from Saint John's University, Zhejiang University, University of Shanghai, Utopia University, and Aurora University were incorporated into ECNU to form a comprehensive multi-disciplinary university. Some of the academics at the Tongji University and Jiaotong University were also transferred to ECNU.[3]

In March 1959, ECNU was authenticated as one of the first 16 National Key Universities in China, and this status was reaffirmed in 1978. From 1972 to 1980 (during the Cultural Revolution in mainland China), five schools including ECNU were merged to create Shanghai Normal University, and in 1980 its original name was resumed.[4]

Diploma of East China Normal University, 1953.

University Library, Minhang Campus.

In June 1986, ECNU was selected to be one of the first 33 higher education institutions authorized, by the State Council, to establish their graduate schools. In 1996, ECNU passed the prerequisites appraisal and became one of universities sponsored by the major national program "Project 211". In 2006, the Ministry of Education and Shanghai Municipality signed into a partnership for co-sponsoring the development of the university, qualifying ECNU as a member of the "Project 985".

ECNU is now under the direct auspices of the Ministry of Education. The university sponsors or supervises publication of more than 20 academic journals and periodicals. The library collection exceeds 4,000,000 volumes. 25 primary or secondary schools are affiliated to the university.

Along with several other Chinese universities, East China Normal University has hosted the United Kingdom (UK) government-funded Study China Programme for a number of years.[11] In this programme, students from UK institutions spend one to two summer months studying Mandarin Chinese and Chinese culture at a university in China. The programme is organised by the University of Manchester and is fully funded by UK government bodies, such as the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills. Its purpose is to strengthen ties between UK university students and China, in particular as relatively few British students enroll in degrees in China. The programme has increased relations between ECNU and numerous leading UK universities.[12]

Sponsored by Shanghai Municipal Education Commission and Shanghai Foreign Affairs Office, the Diplomats' Program has been organized by ECNU since 2011. In this program, consular officials from over 20 countries spend two months during summer studying at East China Normal University.[13]

• Faculty of Education
• Faculty of Economics and Management
• School of Humanities and Social Science
• School of Social Development
• School of Foreign Languages
• International College of Chinese Studies
• School of Psychology and Cognitive Science
• Preschool and Special Education School
• School of Sports and Health
• School of Communication
• School of Art
• School of Design
• School of Urban and Regional Science
• School of Ecological and Environmental Sciences
• School of Geographic Sciences
• School of Life Sciences
• School of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering
• School of Science and Engineering
• School of Information Science and Technology
• School of Computer Science and Software Engineering
• International Teachers College of Chinese Language and Culture
• Meng Xiancheng College (Teachers College)
• School of Data Science and Engineering

• College of Continuing Education
• College of Distance Education

• Institute of Estuary and Coastal Research
• Institute for Advanced International and Regional Studies
• Institute for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies
• Institute of Arts
• Si-mian Institute for Advanced Studies in Humanities

The Software Engineering Institute is one of the 35 statewide pilot schools of software engineering granted by Ministry of Education in 2001; the International College of Chinese Studies is among the eight State Bases for Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language, certified by the Ministry of Education. ECNU is designated as one of the National Liberal Arts and Basic Sciences Training and Research Bases in its disciplines of Chinese, History, Mathematics, Geography, Psychology and Physics.

ECNU's Business School was founded by the pioneer of China's Economics and Financing studies, Prof. Chen Biao Ru. Hence, the Business School of ECNU inherited the good tradition and enjoys top reputation in the economic and financial circle in China.

The Ministry of Education's Training Center for Secondary School Principals at ECNU is a state base for the training of secondary school principals in Mainland China and advanced studies of those in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. ECNU is the only university in China designated as a national training center for elite secondary school principals and enjoys the reputation as the "Whampoa Military Academy" for secondary school principals.

It has two State Key Laboratories, one National Field Observation and Research Station, six Key Labs or Engineering Centers, and six Key Research Bases for Humanities and Social Sciences of the Ministry of Education. ECNU is authorized to offer 112 doctoral programs covering 14 Primary Disciplines, 178 master's programs in six specialties, i.e., Education, Public Administration, Engineering, Physical Education and Business Administration, and to set up 14 post-doctoral mobile research stations.

• State Key Laboratory of Estuarine and Coastal Research[14]
• State Key Laboratory of Precision Spectroscopy[15]

• Key Laboratory of Brain Functional Genomics, Ministry of Education
• Key Laboratory of Geography-Information Science, Ministry of Education
• Shanghai Institute of Brain Functional Genomics[16]
• Shanghai Key Laboratory of Regulatory Biology[17]
• Shanghai Key Laboratory of Green Chemistry and Green Chemical Process
• Shanghai Key Laboratory of Urbanization and Ecological Restoration
• Shanghai Key Laboratory of Trustworthy Computing[17]

• Institute of Curriculum and Instruction[18]
• Institute of Modern Chinese Thought and Culture
• Center for Russian Studies
• Center for the Study of Chinese Characters and Their Applications[19]
• Institute of Schooling Reform and Development[20]
• Center for Modern Chinese City Studies[17][21]

• Cornell-ECNU Center for Comparative Culture
• KUL-ECNU Sino-Euro Culture Research Center[22]
• ECNU-UBC Joint Research Core Group on China in Modern World[23]
• Intercultural Education and Communication Research Center (with Humboldt University of Berlin)[24]

The previous main campus was located in the Putuo District of Shanghai, formerly a campus of the Great China University. The campus is an enclosed campus of gardens, lawns, and historic buildings interspersed with modern facilities, in a location in downtown Shanghai. The university also provides transportation by shuttle bus to its new Minhang Campus.

The campus still houses a variety of scientific research institutions, such as State Key Laboratory of Estuarine and Coastal Research and State Key Laboratory of Precision Spectroscopy.

The university's athletic facilities include an outdoor track, outdoor basketball courts, indoor basketball courts, and indoor tennis and badminton courts.

The Minhang new campus is located in the Minhang District on the outskirts of metropolitan Shanghai. Most administrative and academic framework of the university and the majority of undergraduate and graduate students are situated at this campus, which is accompanied by the Minhang Campus of Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

• Chen Danyan: Writer
• Dai Houying: Writer
• Ge Fei: Writer. Professor of literature at Tsinghua University
• Mu Shiying: Writer

• Yu Lizhong: Chancellor of New York University Shanghai
• Wang Xingyu: President of East China University of Science and Technology (March 1994–July 2004)
• Xi Nanhua: Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Vice-President of University of Chinese Academy of Sciences
• Liu Boli: Academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering
• Stephen Cheng: Academician of the National Academy of Engineering, United States
• Joe Z. Tsien: Neuroscientist, Georgia Health Sciences University
• He Jifeng: Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and academic at ECNU
• Yuan Zhongyi: Archaeologist, praised as "the father of the Terracotta Warriors"

• Han Zheng: Vice President of China, Vice Premier of China, Member of the 19th Politburo Standing Committee
• He Xian: Vice Minister of the Ministry of Personnel of the P.R.China
• Chen Hao: Governor of Yunnan, China
• Yin Yicui: Chairwoman of the Shanghai People's Congress
• Li Yuanchao

• Daniela Anahi Bessia: Celebrity performer for the China Central Television, Hunan Television, Shanghai Media Group, etc. | Culture and Entertainment
• Jason Jiang: Founder of Focus Media
• Dong Qing: Television host

• Liu Xiang: Gold medalist of 110-meter hurdles in the 2004 Summer Olympics

• Glenn Duffie Shriver: From Grand Valley State University, he did a study abroad program at ECNU. He was later convicted in the U.S. of attempting to commit espionage.[44]

• Meng Xiancheng: Educator, the first president of East China Normal University.
• Li Linsi: Educator and diplomat who has been recognized as one of the key figures in modern Chinese cultural and diplomatic history.
• Shen Zhihua: Professor of history at ECNU, expert in the history of the Soviet Union, Sino-Soviet relations, and the Cold War.
• Lü Simian: Chinese historian, former professor of history at ECNU.
• Shi Zhecun: Author, former professor of Chinese Language and Literature.
• Hu Huanyong: Demographer, forefather of modern Chinese demography and the founder of China's population geography.
• He Jifeng: Computer scientist, member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
• Ghil'ad Zuckermann: Linguist, revivalist.

• East China Normal University Alumni Association[45]
• East China Normal University Alumni Association in US[46]
• East China Normal University Alumni Association in North California[47]