China and Pittsburgh strengthen ties

Chinese Vice-Premier Liu Yandong is greeted by Chancellor Patrick Gallagher of the University of Pittsburgh upon her arrival at the university for a visit on Friday afternoon. It is part of Liu's US trip which will lead to the 6th China-US High-Level Consultation on People-to-People Exchange, which will officially kick off in Washington on June 23 by Liu and US Secretary of State John Kerry. [Photo by Chen Weihua/China Daily]

On Friday afternoon, Liu visited the University of Pittsburgh, meeting Chancellor Patrick Gallagher and other school leaders. She visited the Confucius Institute there and observed a Chinese language class and a student's performance of a Chinese cultural program. She also went to the university's medical school where a group of Tsinghua University students are studying.

The University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University have been engaged in extensive collaboration with their Chinese counterparts,including faculty and student exchanges and scientific research. In 2007, the University of Pittsburgh and Wuhan University jointly launched the Confucius Institute. Seven Confucius Classrooms and a satellite center were later established at the university.

In 2011, the University of Pittsburgh's School of Medicine and Tsinghua University's School of Medicine in Beijing entered into a collaborative education and research agreement to bring Chinese medical and graduate students to Pittsburgh for training in biomedical research.

In 2014, the University of Pittsburgh and Sichuan University broke ground on the Sichuan University-Pittsburgh Institute. In a plate unveiling on Friday afternoon under Liu's presence, the institute offers undergraduate degrees in industrial engineering, mechanical engineering and materials science and engineering.

The University of Pittsburgh admitted about 1,560 Chinese mainland students in fall of 2013, according to school statistics.

In November 2012, Carnegie Mellon University and Sun Yet-sen University established the SYSU-CMU Joint Institute of Engineering (JIE), offering graduate and doctoral degrees to students majoring in electrical and computer engineering.