Sichuan Normal University is the oldest normal university (teacher's college) located in Chengdu, Sichuan, China. It is the largest provincial key university with the most complete courses offered among the provincial universities and colleges in Sichuan province. It has about 35,000 students with 32,000 full-time undergraduates and 3,000 graduate students. There are about 3,000 faculty and staff, of whom 770 are professors and associate professors, and 150 have Doctorates. 17 academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Engineering have accepted SNU positions as chief, part-time or emeritus professors.
The origin of SNU
can be traced back to China Northeast University (CNEU) when it moved to Santai
County, Sichuan Province in 1938. After the War of Resistance Against Japan
(1937–1945) was over, CNEU moved back to Northeast China. However, some CNEU
faculty and staff stayed in Sichuan, and in 1946, they established Northern
Sichuan Workers and Peasants College on the same site of CNEU campus in Santai
County. Later, it was renamed as Northern Sichuan University and moved to
Nanchong City. In 1952, during the period of the merger of universities and
colleges across the country, Sichuan Teachers College (STC) came into being. It
mainly grew out of Northern Sichuan University, and at the same time, it merged
with Eastern Sichuan College of Education and some specialties from Sichuan
University and West China University. In 1956, STC moved to Chengdu, and in
1985, approved by the State Commission of Education, STC was renamed as Sichuan
Normal University.
SNU is located
southeast of downtown Chengdu, and is outside Chengdu's 2nd Ring Road. It now
has four campuses, the main campus, the Eastern Campus, Chenglong Campus and
Shizishan Campus. The campus which is located in Jinjiang District is the main
campus, and it covers an area of 3,000 mu.Its library is the third largest in
Sichuan Province, and it has a collection of bound volumes of 300,000 titles.
SNU consists of 18
colleges: Chinese Language and Literature, Mathematics and Software, Continuing
Education and others. Approved by the Ministry of Education, SNU set up two
separate colleges. These campuses have 21 research institutes and sectors, 69
undergraduate specialties and 42 specialties entitled to grant master's
degrees. SNU is also authorized to enroll students for master's degree in
education and students for certificates in various specialties at graduate
level. In addition, SNU has 29 key disciplines and laboratories as well as
personnel training centers.
In the past five
years, SNU faculty staff have undertaken over 400 research projects that come
from the National Social Sciences Foundation, the National Natural Sciences
Foundation, the Xinhuo Program at national level, the National 863 Key Program
of High Technology, the Tenth-Five Years Planning of the National Education
Science as well as other scientific and technological programs at ministerial
or provincial level. In addition, SNU faculty staffs have published over 500
academic books and 5,000 academic theses and papers. 380 of these were printed
by SCI, EI, or ISTP journals. SNU faculty staffs also have obtained 130 prizes
in the name of Scientific and Technologic Awards at national or provincial
level, Invention Awards, Philosophy and Social Sciences Achievement Awards and
High Quality Teaching Achievement Awards.