On June 30, at the invitation of Richard Davies, Vice President for International Affairs of Newcastle University in UK, XMU Vice President Yang Bin joined an online conversation on international exchanges and cooperation during the pandemic. Director of Office of Confucius Institute Affairs Mao Tongwen and Deputy Director of the Office of International Cooperation and Exchange Yu Hongbo also attended the meeting.

Vice President Yang sent his greetings to Richard Davies and  Newcastle University. He hoped that the exchanges and research cooperation between the two sides would be further strengthened. Richard Davies believed the pandemic has brought a paradigm shift in college education, and the online collaboration could be an important part of the efforts to tackle global warming and reduce carbon footprints. Both agreed that online courses and communication have become a new trend for colleges where mutual complementarity and sharing online learning resources are imperative in order to benefit more students. Meanwhile, the two parties also went into details of the cooperation and agreed to translate it into action in conjunction with relevant units such as the administrative departments, technical departments and other colleges.

Mao Tongwen introduced the latest development of Confucius Institutes. Richard Davies affirmed his continued support for the Confucius Institute jointly established by the two universities, and expressed his willingness to enhance partnership in international Chinese language education.