Drexel delegation will visit partners over seas in Asia | The Triangle

Drexel delegation will visit partners over seas in Asia

On Nov. 1, a delegation from Drexel University composed of President John A. Fry and faculty from the Close School of Entrepreneurship, the Antoinette Westphal College of Media Arts and Design, the College of Engineering, the School of Biomedical Engineering, Science and Health Systems and the Kline School of Law will be leaving for a week-long trip to China and Korea. The packed itinerary includes trips to the Drexel-SARI Center, a partnership with the Shanghai Advanced Research Institute, the Shanghai Institute of Technology. This trip also serves to celebrate the launch of a new research collaboration program at the Korean Advanced Institute for Science and Technology.

Drexel’s Shanghai partner, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, is the China’s leading research and development center in natural sciences and innovative technologies. SARI is a research organization established by both the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Shanghai government. It is with SARI that Drexel was able to construct the Drexel-SARI Center, one of the first collaborations that Drexel held in that region. President Fry began the collaboration with the support and help of Jiang Mianheng, a Drexel alumnus and Vice President of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The Drexel-SARI center houses Drexel’s research collaborations and educational partnerships. Adjacent to the Drexel-SARI Center is Shanghai Tech University. President Fry is also taking the opportunity to visit the newly established Shanghai Tech University, with whom Drexel is proudly collaborating to provide further research, co-op and education opportunities to students. Following those visits, the delegation will take the opportunity visit Shanghai Jiao Tong University, with whom Drexel maintains a research partnership.

Following the China leg, the delegation will travel to Seoul, South Korea Nov. 4, which will mark Fry’s first time in the nation. Fry will celebrate the launch of the new research collaboration at the KAIST during this segment of the trip. The aforementioned new partnership will take effect beginning in spring term, when students from Drexel will be able to go to Korea’s National NanoFab Center for three-to-six-month co-ops. KAIST is the location that many Korea-based technology and manufacturing companies, such as Samsung and Hyundai, go to have their designs refined and improved and the partnership with KAIST provides students with interesting and unique new opportunities, especially to gain real-world industry experience in another country. As a part of the partnership, students from KAIST will have the opportunity to co-op in Philadelphia with researches in the A.J. Drexel Nanomaterials Institute, the Drexel Biological Actuation, Sensing and Transport Laboratory and other research groups from the College of Engineering. Hoping to build more bridges, the delegation will visit leadership at Seoul National University and Hanyang University.

“Trips like these are so important,” Julie Mostov, a delegation member and vice provost for global initiatives, told DrexelNow. “You can’t have a partnership model if you don’t nurture the cooperation. You have to show your partners that you’re serious, that you’re putting capital into it, human capital and resources. You have to show them who we are. It gives meaning to our relationship, it iterates what our strengths are, and it helps us make an impact globally, which is who we are as a university,” she continued.

This trip will help maintain the University’s positive relationships with international institutions, and continue Drexel’s tradition of offering students opportunities to explore both and their own passions.