I'm pleased to announce that as of a little more than a week ago, Pepperdine has begun an academic partnership with Fudan University (复旦大学). Our signing ceremony was an event of great pomp and circumstance (as you can see for yourself from the pictures); Charles Hall, the Dean of International Programs (whom many of you may already know) came to Shanghai specifically for the event. If you don’t like reading details, the rest of what follows can be summed up as 'awesomeness.'

Unlike most of Pepperdine's other programs, which typically hire local faculty directly, Chinese law dictates that all teaching must be done through an approved educational institution, which is ultimately overseen by the Ministry of Education (whom I lovingly refer to as 'Moe'). Even the Pepperdine visiting faculty must be invited as a 'guest lecturer' of sorts to teach students in the program. Classes, visa assistance, and all teaching services must be provided through an academic partner – there is no other option, and this makes a university partner here extremely important.

Our search for a university partner started this past fall; William and I began by arranging meetings with virtually every major university in Shanghai. Although we considered many factors, three qualities were of the utmost importance: academic reputation and quality, the ability to offer the kinds of classes we need in English, and people at the university that were genuinely interested in an academic collaboration and who seemed easy to work with. After meeting with every major university in Shanghai over a period of several months, only a few rose to the top of candidate list – and ultimately, our final candidate was easy to choose based on it's ideal fit with these qualities.

Fudan University is the perfect match for Pepperdine's Shanghai Program. Although rankings vary depending on who is conducting the rating, Fudan is consistently ranked 3rd or 4th among all universities in China. This is true even of casual encounters on the street; Fudan is known throughout all of China as being one of the top universities in the entire country – truly an 'Ivy League' of the Chinese University system. In particular, Fudan is most renowned for it's strength in the humanities: history, language, culture, literature, art, etc. – which is exactly what we need offered in most of the general education requirements of our classes. Needless to say, Fudan also attracts the highest caliber of faculty in Asia.

On top of studying in one of the most unique and exciting cities in the world, you will now have the privilege of saying that you did so in a program that was partnered with one of the top universities in China and Asia. This is a huge step in the development of the program – in fact, it is the foundation of virtually everything else. For a more detailed history of Fudan, visit the Wikipedia entry for the University or Fudan's English site.