At the invitation of the Council of Graduate Schools (CGS), a delegation composed of the deans (vice presidents) of five universities, including China Agricultural University, South China University of Technology, Xiamen University, Hunan University and East China University of Science and Technology, was invited by the Chinese Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) to visit the United States on December 5-21, 2006. -They attended the 46th Annual Meeting of the Council of Graduate Schools of America held by CGS in Washington, D.C. (Dec. 5-8), and visited 10 universities/graduate schools such as Harvard and MIT after the meeting.

　　The conference was a major event for graduate education in the U.S., with more than 600 delegates from university graduate schools in the U.S. and other countries attending the conference. Barbara Dai, President of the Council of Graduate Schools of the United States, chaired the conference and introduced the delegation from the Joint Association of Chinese Graduate School Deans to the conference in the opening ceremony with a special warm welcome. During the meeting, the delegation held special discussions with the heads of the American Graduate School Committee, including Debara, and had extensive exchanges on issues of talent cultivation, student exchange and faculty training, and achieved many consensus. The post-meeting visit tour gave everyone a further understanding and feeling of the U.S. universities/graduate schools, which was very rewarding. The delegation will provide a detailed report of the visit and summary to the authorities.(Contributed by the delegation of deans to the U.S.)

Asecretariat of ACGS

December 21st, 2006