Starting a New Journey into the Future
Forging ahead with Enterprise and Fortitude
—2023 New Year’s Message from Chengdu University of Technology
Gong Hao, Secretary of the Party Committee of CDUT Liu Qingyou, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee and President of CDUT
Time is the best record that shows our great endeavors and footprints of forging ahead with enterprise and fortitude. As 2023 draws near, we would like to, on behalf of the Party and administrative leadership, extend our heartfelt thanks, New Year greetings, and best wishes to all our students, faculty and staff, our retired veteran comrades, our alumni, and government officials and friends from all sectors of society who have supported CDUT’s cause and development along the way.
The past 2022 saw the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China convened at a critical time as China wraps up a critical year of its 14th Five-Year Plan, embarks on a new journey to build China into a modern socialist country in all respects and advances toward the Second Centenary Goal. Over the past year, facing changes of a magnitude not seen in a century, challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, and a fast-evolving new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation, CDUT, guided by Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, studied and implemented the gist of the 20th CPC National Congress, led high-quality development with high-quality Party building, balanced COVID-19 response and education and teaching activities well, and broke new ground in multiple key operating indicators, adding an impressive chapter to the history of CDUT.
In 2022, we studied and practiced the gist of the 20th CPC National Congress and translated this effort into a strong driver for development. We developed an action plan to study, publicize and implement the gist of the 20th CPC National Congress by creating a dedicated website, special features and a dedicated column, among other platforms for learning and publicity, and organizing focused thematic learning, specialist coaching, and workshops, setting off a craze quickly. We put together a team of teachers and students to give interactive speeches and talks by target group to realize tangible and effective coverage. Moreover, we launched major topics on studying and expounding the essence of the 20th National Congress and released a range of theoretical achievements with distinct features of CDUT. We will resolutely implement the decisions and arrangements of the CPC Central Committee, fully implement the fundamental task of cultivating people through virtue, vigorously carry out basic research, original research, and frontier cross-sectional research, cultivate high-level interdisciplinary research teams, and serve the implementation of the strategy of rejuvenating the country through science and education, the strategy of reinvigorating China through human resources, and the strategy of innovation-driven development. These efforts helped the gist of the 20th National Congress take root, flourish and come to fruition at CDUT.
In 2022, we continued to exercise full and rigorous Party self-governance led by high-quality Party building. Fully in line with general requirements for Party building in the new era and guided in particular by the Party’s political building, we improved the primary-level institutional system of Party building, strengthened the organizational system, built a stronger pool of officials and professionals, effectively incorporated political criteria and requirements in the whole process of governing the Party, the university and educational activities. These actions contributed to continuous improvement in the quality of Party building. Our “Cornerstone Laying” Party building was named a Party Building Brand of Institutions of Higher Learning in Sichuan Province, which cemented the political foundation for CDUT’s “Double First-Class” drive. We advanced the comprehensive reform of “Three All-round Education” further by improving leadership and working mechanisms, strengthening ideological and political workforce safeguards, and enhancing the overall quality of ideological and political work, in an effort to solidly boost primary-level Party building through targeted, effective outcomes on this front. We fulfilled the principal responsibility for exercising full and rigorous Party self-governance through on-campus inspections, to continuously create a clean political ecosystem and an enabling environment for development. The Integrity Center, an integrity education base for tertiary institutions in Sichuan, was inaugurated to enable the concept of cleanness to thrive and inspire at colleges and universities in the province.
In 2022, we carried out the fundamental task of fostering morality and cultivating people on all fronts, aiming for high-quality development. The development of disciplines and specialties broke new ground, with Geological Resources and Geological Engineering included in the latest national list of disciplines under the “Double First-Class” initiative, Environment/Ecology and Chemistry ranked among the top 1% of ESI global disciplines ranking, and the number of national first-class undergraduate programs increased to 23. The 19th Gondwana-Asia International Symposium and other important academic conferences were held, and our academic influence was constantly increasing. Research and innovation made new breakthroughs, with 80 NSFC-funded projects approved, including 21 Class-A social science projects, with a combined contractual funding of more than RMB 600 million, of which approximately RMB 500 million was in place, all the latter three figures recording new highs. We had a significant increase in the number of high-level papers, including 906 papers in the SCI Expanded (or SCIE) , of which 97 were highly cited papers. We won a wide range of science and technology awards, including 13 granted by the provincial government and 37 by the private sector, of which 23 were first prizes. International exchanges and cooperation have been booming, and international education has been steadily improved. We have been approved as the Sichuan Overseas Consular Protection Publicity and Education Base, and our foreign experts have won the 2022 Sichuan International Science and Technology Cooperation Award.
In 2022, we took the opportunity of welcoming evaluation and promoting construction to comprehensively improve the quality of talent training. Taking the new round of education evaluation as an opportunity, we comprehensively deepened the comprehensive reform of undergraduate education and teaching, and the quality of talent training has been further promoted, with the number of provincial education and teaching achievement awards reaching 23, including 3 special prizes and 8 first prizes, and thus achieving the best results in history; faculty building made fresh progress, recruiting 1 leading talent team and 165 Mt. Everest talents, and introducing 3 part-time talents, with the addition of two scholars under the Changjiang Scholars Program and one leading scholar in technological innovation under the National Ten Thousand Talent Program, as well as 53 talent projects, titles and honors at provincial and higher levels. Some of our scholars were included in the "Lifetime Science Influence List" and "2022 Annual Science Influence List", and others won the Guanghua Engineering Science and Technology Award and the Xplorer Prize. A group of model teachers were granted the "Sichuan May Day Labor Medal" and won prizes at the National Teaching Innovation Contest for College Teachers; we successfully undertook the National Geological Skills Competition for College Students, and innovated the new way of competition with "offline + online" double track interconnection with regular epidemic prevention and control, and won 4 grand prizes and 1 first prize; CDUT students won 49 first prizes at national Class-A contests for college students, including the “Internet+” Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition, and moved up to the 60th place in national contest for college students rankings. Also, our students received such honorary titles as the Stars of Self-improvement of Chinese College Students.
In 2022, we played our due part in serving the country through education and building China into a world leader in science and technology, committed to serving national strategies and driving local development. Focusing on major national, industrial and local needs, we accelerated the translation of research results, with 62 empowered results added, which helped translate major research results into advanced productive forces. The think tank for Natural Disaster Prevention and Geological Environment Protection has once again been selected as one of the top 100 think tanks of Chinese universities and entered the top 50, providing strong support for economic and social development. Promoting the strategic development of "one body and two wings", we deepened cooperation with government, industry and business, facilitating deeper government-industry-academia-research-application integration. Chengdu Natural History Museum (the Museum of Chengdu University of Technology), a joint project with the municipal government, went into trial operation and we were awarded the national popular science and education base once again. We consolidated and expanded the effective alignment of poverty alleviation achievements with rural revitalization, with our poverty alleviation assessment team winning such honors as “Sichuan Youth May Fourth Medal Collective”, playing our due role in contributing to rural revitalization.
Struggle entails hard work, and the achievements have not come easily. As 2023 is approaching, we stand at the door of a new year, looking into the way ahead with hopes and expectations and without fears. We will continue to write a new chapter of high-quality development with rock-solid confidence and perseverance. Let’s start a new journey into the future now!
Wish our great country peace and prosperity!
Wish our university progress and greater success!
Wish all our students, faculty and staff happiness and good health!
