By Wang Yuan
Special to the Tsinghua News Center
The annual Advisory Board meeting of Tsinghua University’s School of Economics and Management (SEM) was held at the Main Building of Tsinghua University on August 8. At the meeting, Professor Qian Yingyi, Dean of Tsinghua SEM reported the significant progress the School has made on student, faculty, and SEM's internationalization process etc. during the past year. The board members held discussion regarding further development of Tsinghua SEM.
On the night of August 8, all the participating members attended the opening ceremony of the 29th Olympic Games held in the National Stadium, also known as the Bird's Nest, in north Beijing.
Before the meeting, Chinese Vice Premier Wang Qizhan held talks with the overseas members of the advisory board attending the 2008 annual meeting. Minister of Education Zhou Ji attended the meeting. Wang expressed his welcome to the visiting members, wishing them an impressive night on the day for opening ceremony of Beijing Olympic Games.
This year saw the ninth meeting of the Advisory Board, which was held on the same day with the grand opening of Beijing Olympic Games-when China hosts the world with pride. The 2008 annual meeting had the most attendees since the advisory board was established in October, 2000.
Tsinghua SEM’s development benefits tremendously from the contributions of its Advisory Board, which works for the common goal of making Tsinghua SEM one of the premier economics and management schools in the world. During recent years, it has helped the School create extensive international links, build up research institutions and contribute valuable ideas to the School’s strategic development.
Members of the Board are made up of elite business leaders, visionary government officials and renowned scholars from internationally renowned businesses and academic institutions. Former Premier Zhu Rongji is the Honorary Chairman of the Board. Mr. Henry M. Paulson Jr., US Secretary of the Treasury and former Chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs, had been the founding Chairman of the Board. Lord John Browne, Group Chief Executive of BP p.l.c. was the second Chairman of the Advisory Board and the current Chairman is H. Lee Scott, Jr., president and CEO of Wal-Mart Stores, Inc..
