2020-01-15 Good News: School of Languages and Communication Studies Wins 2019 Distinguished School Award. 

On January 15, 2020, the results of Beijing Jiaotong University’s 2019 institutional performance evaluation were announced, with the School of Languages and Communication Studies receiving the Distinguished School Award. The year 2019 marked the launch and implementation of the national “Double Ten-Thousand” plan for undergraduate education and the comprehensive advancement of the “Six Excellences and One Top” initiative. At our university, the implementation of the “13th Five-Year Plan” and the “Double First-Class” initiative gained full momentum, with discipline development making an all-out effort in preparation for the fifth round of discipline evaluation. Faculty and students of the School, while rooted in the fields of languages and communication, kept the broader university in mind. Guided by the purpose of supporting the university’s “Double First-Class” development, focusing on our own discipline advancement, and centering on talent cultivation and scientific research, we seized the new opportunities created by the “China’s Standards of English Language Ability” and the “2.0 Plan for Educating and Training Outstanding Journalism and Communication Talents”. We deepened reforms in education and teaching, while fully leveraging the role of public English instruction in providing language service support for the university’s “Double First-Class” initiative and “international talent cultivation”. We dedicated ourselves to supporting the entire university in building the software and hardware conditions for international development, striving to create a warm, harmonious cultural atmosphere and a scientific, democratic administrative service environment. Through the collective efforts of all faculty and students, members of the Subcommittee on English Language Teaching Guidance and the Committee on Journalism and Communication Teaching Guidance actively participated in the national “Double Ten-Thousand” plan for undergraduate education. The Communication Studies program was successfully approved as a municipal-level first-class specialty development site in Beijing. The School secured two National Social Science Fund projects, one Ministry of Education Philosophy and Social Science Fund project, and two Beijing Philosophy and Social Science Fund projects, with newly added research funding reaching 5.3217 million yuan. Courses such as “Business English”, “Advanced Comprehensive English”, and “Intermediate Spanish I” were launched on the Chinese University MOOC platform. Two teachers received the grand prize in the Beijing division of the “Teaching Star” competition organized by Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press. One teacher won first prize in the Beijing Graduate English Micro-lecture Competition, while another was honored with the Outstanding Academic Award at the Second Youth New Media Academic Research Forum. One undergraduate thesis in English was recognized as an outstanding graduation project among Beijing universities. The pass rate for the Test for English Majors Band 4 (TEM-4) reached 100%, with an outstanding rate of 48%, and the pass rate for TEM-8 reached 79.5%, setting new records. The inaugural cohort of Portuguese majors graduated with a 100% employment rate. The School hosted the thematic forum “China’s Railway Going Global: Language Services and Discourse Communication” as part of the 70th Anniversary Forum of New China’s Translation Industry and the 2019 China Translation Association Annual Conference, aiming to enhance the discipline’s role in serving society and expanding its influence in line with the national strategy of building a strong transportation network. The School also organized a sub-forum under the Beijing Jiaotong University International Young Scholars Forum. The Master’s program in Journalism and Communication began enrollment, comprehensively strengthening and expanding the teaching and research capabilities of the first-level discipline of Journalism and Communication. The Uruguay Country and Region Studies Center continued to serve as a think tank and facilitated the establishment of a second Confucius Institute. Nearly 1,500 hours of one-on-one academic English writing guidance were provided to students and faculty across the university, contributing to the publication of 125 English papers based on incomplete statistics. The School successfully co-hosted the semifinals of the 2019 Beijing Graduate English Speech Competition organized by the Beijing Higher Education Society and the Beijing Graduate English Teaching Research Association. Students guided by our faculty achieved awards in multiple competitions, including the 2019 “FLTRP-ETIC Cup” National English Public Speaking Contest, the Second “SFLEP Cup” Intercultural Competence Contest for Beijing University Students, the Beijing International Model United Nations Conference, the Cross-Strait Interpreting Competition, and the Model APEC Competition. The public welfare initiative “Jiaoda’s Yiluxing” ranked first nationwide in the China Soong Ching Ling Foundation’s public welfare project evaluation. The anti-drug publicity film “Stained” won second prize in the microfilm category at the “First National College Student Anti-Drug Public Welfare Micro-Art Competition”. The original public welfare song MV “Come with Me, to That Place” garnered significant attention from mainstream media, including reposts by “People’s Daily”, the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League’s Weibo account, “Guangming Online”, and the “Xuexi Qiangguo” platform, with video views exceeding 1.52 million. The School received awards such as the Comprehensive Evaluation Award from the Labor Union and the “Precision Guidance Service Special Award” for graduate employment and entrepreneurship support. The year 2019, now behind us, was a memorable one, marking both the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China and the 10th anniversary of the establishment of the School of Languages and Communication Studies. Looking back, we have stayed true to our founding mission and kept our responsibilities firmly in mind. Looking ahead, we will seize the day and live it to the fullest, striving with unwavering dedication for the next decade of the School and for the mission and responsibility of fostering virtue through education and strengthening the nation through learning.