The education of business at ZISU was started in 1997. The School of International Business was established in May, 2021, cooperating with the School of Innovation & Entrepreneurship. It includes 6 departments, 4 institutes and 1 experimental center, and its cross-functionality embraces economics, management and science.
There are 6 undergraduate majors International Economy and Trade, International Business, Cross-border E-commerce, E-commerce, Financial Engineering, Computer Science and Technology and 1 joint post-graduated program in International Business. Therein, Cross-border E-commerce is the first batch of approved majors in China in 2020. International Business and International Economics and Trade are the provincial first-class majors. The Applied Economics is the provincial first-class discipline. With over 2000 full-time students that includes overseas students, the School of International Business is currently the largest school in ZISU.
There are currently 92 teaching staff, including 75 full-time teachers with 13 professors and 25 associated professors. Around 50% of the teachers hold senior professional titles, 95% have postgraduate qualifications (70% have PhD degrees) and over 50% have overseas teaching or study experience. Dual-talented teachers are over 80%. There are several foreign experts, 5 distinguished professors, 5‘Xixi scholars’, and 6 ‘new century 151’ cultivated talents. In addition, the school hires over 30 industry and enterprise mentors.
There are 4 institutes, they are respectively‘Institute of Digital Economy and ECO Development’‘Institute of Cross-cultural E-commerce Industry’ (Cooperated with Ministry of Education and Department of Commerce), ‘Institute of Latin America Studies’(Cooperated with Ministry of Education), and ‘Institute of Entrepreneurship and Sustainable Finance’. The scientific research capabilities of teaching staff are solid. During the last 5 years, there have been 10 national scientific research projects, over 20 provincial scientific research projects, over 30 bureau-level projects, and about 40 crossing scientific research projects. Approximate 200 papers have been published, including 20 authoritative papers(included by SCI and SSCI), 50 core and first-level papers. Almost 20 books have been published. 30 instructions are written by bureaucratic or above government sectors. More than 60 patents are proved in invention, and software copyright.
There are about 2,000 square meters experimental platform, worth 25 million yuan, including cross-border e-commerce comprehensive lab, big data and e-commerce security lab, financial and quantified analysis lab, and e-cross mass maker space.
In order to cultivate the international and foreign trade applied talent, the school focuses on industry-university cooperation, entrepreneurship innovation and foreign languages. It is a member of the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD). The international professional certification of EPAS is in progress. In cooperation with universities in Latin America, ‘Cross-border E-commerce 2 + 2 International Class’ has been set up. With the support of Provincial Department of Commerce, Institute of Pujiang Cross-border E-commerce was established. With the support of Chinese cross-border e-commerce comprehensive zone (Hangzhou), the school has been working with world famous companies such as Amazon,Ali and Google through industry-university cooperation. Besides the degree, 90% of the undergraduates in majors such as International Business, E-commerce and others have also got vocational qualifications. In recent years, the school has got more than 30 provincial and ministerial awards and several national innovation and entrepreneurial project approvals. The graduates are able to master more than one foreign language, such as English, Japanese, Spanish and so on. The graduates’ competitiveness has been continuously improved, and the employment rate in 2022 reached 90%. The graduates have been widely recognized by employers, including Alibaba, Amazon, Zheshang Futures and so on (over 10 of the graduates have got 10 million yuan in sales volume). Some of the graduates have gone on to further studies in well-known universities worldwide, such as Capital University of Economics and Business, Shanghai International Studies University, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies and University of Nottingham, Washington University in St Louis. The school has been appraised as a ‘Provincial Key Experimental Teaching Demonstration Center’‘provincial demonstration base in industry-university integration in Cross-border E-commerce’and ‘advanced group in provincial educational system’.
‘To engineer the Tongda Tower(Giant Tower of Practicality)in the new age’ is the school vision. There was the Tower of Babel in the ancient West, there is tower of practicality in the modern East. The school keeps a foothold in fostering characters and civil virtues; takes an initiative to connect the development of ‘One Belt One Road’; follows and meets the university’s ‘3 Places and 4 Regional Development Strategy’; focuses on ‘digital, cross-cultural and green development’concept. The school spares no effort in striving after innovation as we move into a future full of possibility!