The founding session of the DKU Western Returned Students’ Association was held on campus alongside the second Kunshan meeting.
Duke Kunshan University played host to two branches of the Western Returned Students’ Association (WRSA), a network of scholars and professionals who are back in China after studying overseas.
The Duke Kunshan campus was the venue for both the second general meeting of Kunshan WRSA and the founding session of DKU WRSA.
During the Nov. 10 meeting, Duke Kunshan Chancellor Dr. Yaolin Liu was elected the second president of Kunshan WRSA, following in the footsteps of inaugural president Professor Youmei Feng, the former DKU chancellor who becomes the association’s honorary president. In addition, Duke Kunshan was awarded the status as the education base in Kunshan for returning scholars.
“As a Sino-foreign cooperative university jointly founded by Duke University in the United States, Wuhan University in China and the Kunshan Municipal Government, Duke Kunshan University is a highly international community and is working hard to build an international cooperative education model area,” Liu said.
“Duke Kunshan University will gather and give full play to the collective wisdom and strength to help the city’s Western Returned Scholars Association become a platform and home for overseas students in the city to deepen friendship, develop careers and make progress together.”
Zhou Wei, member of the Standing Committee of the Suzhou Municipal Party Committee and secretary of the Kunshan Municipal Party Committee, expressed his hope in a letter to the meeting that Kunshan WRSA would continue to function as a rich talent pool of overseas-educated professionals ready to serve the country and its people.
At the founding meeting of the DKU WRSA held simultaneously to the Kunshan one, Duke Kunshan professor Dr. Huang Kaizhu was elected its first president. Kaizhu, a professor of electrical and computer engineering and the director of the Data Science Research Center at DKU, delivered a speech titled “Trusted Artificial Intelligence: Foundations, Methods and Applications”.
The WRSA was founded nationally in 1913 to foster innovation, entrepreneurship, connections and collaboration among Chinese returning home from overseas study.
