On April 23, SDU-ANU Joint Science College held the first Dean's Coffee Time in the reading room, Dianzi building. Zhou Junxia, head of the Academic English Group hosted the event. Prof. Lv Guangshi, Executive Dean of JSC, Prof. Chang Xiaomei, Vice Dean of JSC, and Prof. Bai Ming, Vice Dean of JSC were invited to attend the event. Some students of the 2019 and 2020 cohorts also participated.
At the beginning, Zhou Junxia asked the students about the three realms of Wang Guowei's reading, which introduced the first theme of this event, backward glance at the past ten years. First of all, Prof. Lv Guangshi shared with the students the most memorable and meaningful decade in his life, from graduation to his professional achievements. Then, Prof. Bai Ming shared his decade of education pursuit, from a freshman at university to a PhD and a young scholar. Prof. Chang Xiaomei shared the most important decade in her life, from entering the university to further studies abroad. The experiences, according to her, have helped her a lot in dealing with the students’ questions and doubts in class with calmness and self-assurance.
Then Ms. Zhou Junxia led to the next topic, the original dream with the expression "going up to the tall building alone". By sharing the story of setting a goal as a child and constantly working hard to reach it in her youth, Prof. Chang Xiaomei inspired the students to remain true to their original aspiration and forge ahead. She told that the most valuable thing while studying abroad was learning from the personal experience beyond reading books, seeing and feeling different people and things and their different ways of doing things in different culture. Prof. Bai Ming took his own experience as an example and pointed out that there were probably three kinds of people in this world, those who didn’t listen to others and couldn’t do it, those who listened to others but couldn’t do it and those who listened to others and could do it. He encouraged everyone to be the third kind of person.
At the end of the event, the students were free to ask questions. Some students felt difficult to decide whether they would study abroad or not. Others still felt confused about university life, and lack of correct understanding of their majors. The deans answered all their questions and made suggestions on their professional development in the next few years.
The Coffee Time has narrowed the distance between the deans and the students, opened up the students’ eyes and enriched their knowledge. It has helped the students to think clearly of their future academic development and career path.
