Greener pastures? China to establish its first branch campus abroad

Soochow University in China's Jiangsu province is expected to open a branch campus in Laos in 2012. The plan to establish the so-called Soochow University Laos (SUL) has been approved by the Lao government and China’s Jiangsu provincial government. The plan is expected to be approved by the Chinese Ministry of Education later this year. The US$ 25 million campus will offer undergraduate and postgraduate degree programmes, with 12 majors including Chinese language and literature, economy and trade, and engineering. According to reports in Chinese newspaper the People's Daily Online, campus officials hope to recruit approximately 5,000 students to the campus. Initially, Soochow University will send Chinese lecturers to Laos, but in time, more local lecturers will be employed.
 

The local initiative and the wider national strategy

For Soochow University, establishing a branch campus abroad is an important strategy to develop into a world-renowned university. The university is a comprehensive institution with over 1,300 international students from 37 countries. So how does this new branch campus fit into China's wider higher education strategy? Soochow University is part of China's 'Project 211', a reform plan to enhance the international position and prestige of Chinese higher education institutions in the world. This aim should be reached by improving institutional capacity of higher education, strengthening science and technology, and by improving the teaching and research infrastructure at selected Chinese universities. As Soochow University is one of these selected universities, its planned branch campus will probably receive approval from the Chinese Ministry of Education without major problems.
 

Benefits

The Chinese branch campus will likely contribute to local capacity building of higher education in Laos. The campus may also give Lao students an opportunity to obtain a foreign degree from a good university without having to move abroad. At the same time, if the branch campus proves to be successful in the longer term, the Chinese university may indeed gain higher institutional visibility as an 'international university' with global ambitions and a competitive edge in the global (or at least Asian) higher education market. In addition, the new campus will help promote mutual understanding and increase China's influence on education (and in the longer term, possibly, on society and economy) in Laos.
 

South-South branch campus development

It is estimated that half of all international branch campus provision is from North to South (i.e. established by institutions in the North of the globe in countries in the South). In the past few years, however, countries in the South have slowly but increasingly started to establish their own campuses in other Southern countries. In 2006 there appeared to be only five Southern institutions (from India and Pakistan) operating branch campuses abroad (in the Middle East). At this moment, the number of South-South campuses is estimated to be around 26. The planned Chinese campus in Laos is the latest example of this development.

The gradual growth in South-South branch campus provision is largely due to the fact that several institutions in Southern (developing or formerly developing) countries have managed to improve the quality of their local higher education programmes to a sufficient level of maturity to export, coupled with their ambition to do so (for instance, to generate an income from these ventures). The growth is also partly due to the relevance of, and sometimes the need for, Southern-developed higher education programmes in countries with similar socio-economic contexts and directions of development.

China itself hosts a number of foreign branch campuses that were mainly – although not only – established by US and UK institutions (as joint ventures with Chinese institutions). Mostly established in the past decade, these foreign campuses offer China an opportunity to offer degree programmes based on western educational approaches. Now that China itself will open a campus abroad, it will be interesting to see how the initiative will evolve, particularly over the longer term. Soochow University’s strategy to create the first Chinese campus in Laos, a neighbouring and developing country, seems suitable given China’s own rapid educational and economic development and its knowledge of the South-East Asian region. China is currently working hard to improve the quality of education at all levels, and if the campus in Laos will become a success, who knows what the future will hold for the further development of Chinese branch campuses abroad?