On July 14, the first Academy for Confucius Institute Directors was established when the cornerstone was laid on the site of the new Institute building on the Xiang An campus of Xiamen University.

Confucius Institutes are non-profit public institutions affiliated with the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China.They promote the Chinese language and culture, support the teaching of Chinese languageinternationally, and facilitate cultural exchanges. These institutes operate in co-operation with local affiliated colleges and universities around the world. So far, there are about 440 Confucius Institutes in 120 countries partnered with established universities. Xiamen University administrates 15 of them.

The Academy of Confucius Institute Directors is the first academy in charge of the training of directors of Confucius Institutes around the world. At the ceremony, Zhu Chongshi, president of Xiamen University, said it was a great honor for XMU to have the academy located at XMU as it will help to promote the internationalization of the university and Xiamen City. He promised to use all available sources to make the academy a landmark of XMU.

The academy will be composed of "one platform and six centers". That is, a global Chinese multimedia network platform will serve six centers which will include the training of directors and teachers, the exchange of information and resources, courses designing and textbook writing, programs for assessment, sinology research and marketing.On the other hand, the academy will be a collection of multi-ethic and multicultural symbols from 100 different countries. According to the design, the collection will include 100 national flags, 100 statues of important people, 100 masterpieces in music, 100 kinds of magazines andbooks, and 100 trees.　

The academy will be located inthe south west part of the Xiang An Campus of XMU and will cover an area of 34 hectares. When finished, it will facilitate the annual training of 3600 directors.