On September 13, 2012, The Association of Chinese Graduate Schools (ACGS) held a seminar on "Suggestions for the Guidance of National Graduate School Construction" at Peking University Graduate School. The workshop was held at the Graduate School of Peking University. Dozens of deans from Peking University Graduate School, Tsinghua Graduate School, Nankai Graduate School and other ACGS members, and Liao Xiaoling, director of the secretariat of the Association, attended the seminar. The seminar was chaired by Chen XI, Secretary General of the Joint Committee and Dean of Peking University Graduate School.

On the basis of the "Research on the Guiding Opinions on the Construction of National Graduate Schools", a project of the Ministry of Education's Graduate Education Innovation Program completed by ACGS, President Chen XI briefly summarized the importance of graduate education in China's higher education system and the current situation of graduate schools in China. He called on the deans of graduate schools to express their views and consider the construction of national graduate schools and the development and positioning of ACGS. The deans discussed actively and enthusiastically about the problems of the existing graduate schools in terms of institutional setting and function allocation, how to form consistent regulations to guide the development of graduate schools under the trend of self-established graduate schools, how to reasonably position ACGS, and whether ACGS member units can be appropriately expanded.

At the end of the seminar, President Chen XI summarized the speeches of the delegates and pointed out that the key to the construction of graduate schools at present is to grasp several core tasks; the key to ACGS is to build the 56 graduate schools well, summarize and put forward operational guidance, influence the construction of other graduate schools, and give full play to the function of opening and leading. It also calls on the graduate schools to strengthen the interaction with ACGS and promote each other's common development.

Secretariat of ACGS

September 15th, 2012