Shangqiu Normal University | Chinese Universities

Located in Shangqiu, a national historical and cultural city in Henan Province at the junction of Henan, Shandong, Jiangsu and Anhui provinces, Shangqiu Normal University traces its origin to Guide Prefecture Middle School founded in 1905. Its predecessor was Henan Provincial Shangqiu Normal School established in 1945 after the victory of the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression. Approved by the Ministry of Education in 2000, it was formed through the merger of Shangqiu Normal College and Shangqiu College of Education as an undergraduate institution. The university has two campuses, Liangyuan and Suiyang, covering nearly 2,000 mu with a construction area of about 700,000 square meters. Upholding the motto "Follow Natural Principles, Pursue Integrity and Wisdom", the university takes teacher education as its fundamental feature and roots itself in the Central Plains. It is a key university supported by the Ministry of Education’s Collaborative Quality Improvement Program for Teacher Education, a model application-oriented undergraduate university under Henan’s 14th Five-Year Plan, a provincial demonstration university for smart teaching, a provincial university with international characteristics, a Provincial Model Civilized Campus and an Advanced Unit for Primary-level Party Building.

The university pursues coordinated multi-disciplinary development. Its disciplines cover ten categories: economics, law, education, literature, history, science, engineering, management, art and agriculture. It consists of 20 schools offering 65 undergraduate majors. There are 4 national first-class and characteristic majors, 16 provincial first-class and Category B key majors, 6 national first-class undergraduate courses and 97 provincial first-class undergraduate courses. Chemistry has entered the top 1% of ESI global rankings. The university hosts 25,000 full-time students and more than 1,800 faculty and staff, including over 490 senior title teachers, more than 560 PhD holders and over 620 dual-qualified teachers. The faculty includes 3 National Model Teachers, 1 National Excellent Teacher, and more than 60 distinguished talents such as Henan Outstanding Experts, Academic and Technical Leaders, recipients of the Central Plains Talent Program, alongside 3 Huang Danian-style teaching teams. The faculty boasts a rational structure and abundant high-caliber personnel.

The university adheres to the positioning of cultivating application-oriented talents. It innovatively adopts a talent training model integrating production, education, research and innovation, and integrating teaching, practice and training. Closely aligned with seven advanced manufacturing clusters in Henan Province including new materials, electronic information and modern medicine, it prioritizes six application-oriented specialty groups: teacher education, chemical and bioengineering technology, cultural creativity, urban-rural construction and habitat services, supporting services for information and advanced manufacturing, and business services, so as to better match talent training with regional industrial demands. Relying on the School of Innovation and Entrepreneurship, the university has built a comprehensive innovation and entrepreneurship education system running through the whole training process and deeply integrated with academic education. It cooperates with local governments to build cultural and creative parks and entrepreneurship complexes for university students, exploring coordinated development between innovation education and urban construction, and forming an integrated one-stop service model linking industry, university and research. Over the past five years, students have won more than 2,000 awards at national and provincial innovation competitions such as the "Challenge Cup", National College Students’ Entrepreneurship Competition and Mathematical Modeling Contest. Since its founding, the university has cultivated over 350,000 graduates. Outstanding alumni include Liu Wei, Minister of Transport; Jiao Shuhong and Du Jingzhen, recipients of the National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars; Jin Honglei, recipient of the Excellent Young Scientists Fund; Major General Li Shaoshan; entrepreneur Han Jinghe; and national self-improvement model Lu Wenjian. The quality of talent training has won wide public recognition. The university actively carries out international exchanges with dozens of overseas universities and runs 5 Sino-foreign cooperative education programs, steadily lifting its international education level.

The university has achieved remarkable results in integrating industry and education to serve society. Drawing on its strengths in teacher education, it bases itself in Shangqiu, serves the surrounding regions, seizes opportunities brought by technological revolution and industrial transformation, focuses on regional industrial upgrading and high-quality teacher education, implements ten major initiatives, and supports Shangqiu’s strategy of building a strong city in seven fields. It runs 30 provincial and department-level research platforms such as the Henan Engineering Technology Research Center for Optoelectronic Functional Materials. Research outcomes including chitin-based sodium-ion battery materials and early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease have won the Second Prize of Henan Provincial Science and Technology Award. The new breed of Liqun black pigs claimed the Global Animal Welfare Gold Pig Award. An academician workstation for dried chili industrial technology in Henan Province was jointly built with Hunan Academy of Agricultural Sciences and Shangqiu Academy of Sciences, and three new chili varieties have been certified by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs. Breakthroughs in diamond superhard material research help Shangqiu build a "Diamond Capital". The Research Center for Economic and Social Development in the Border Region of Henan, Shandong, Jiangsu and Anhui is recognized as a new think tank and key provincial humanities and social science research base of Henan universities. The university was approved as a base for the transfer and transformation of scientific and technological achievements of Henan universities in 2023, and a provincial demonstration technology transfer institution in 2024. It has established 48 R&D centers together with large-scale enterprises in Shangqiu, formed a development alliance with over 150 enterprises, and carried out 2,378 university-enterprise cooperation projects with total funding reaching 552 million yuan, strongly supporting local economic and social progress.

The university promotes innovative development of regional culture. As the birthplace of the Shang Dynasty, origin of Chinese merchants, hometown of Confucius and Zhuangzi, and home to the historic Yingtian Academy, Shangqiu boasts profound cultural heritage. Inheriting the millennia-long legacy of Yingtian Academy, the university has established platforms including the Research Institute of the Origin of Shang Civilization and Yingtian Academy Research Center to facilitate creative transformation and innovative development of regional culture. It compiles and publishes the large-scale book series Cultural Shangqiu, produces cultural works such as Tour the Ancient Capital of Shangqiu, Trace the History of Chinese Civilization, which have been promoted by Xinhuanet, CCTV Network, Xuexi Qiangguo and other central media. Cultural and creative works including Zhuangzi Lacquer Art, Songcheng Leather Carving, Guide Wood Carving and Liangyuan Tie-dye have gained wide popularity, and its lacquer painting creation leads universities nationwide. The original national opera Yingtian Academy fills the gap in local opera creation in Shangqiu. Its paper-cut works were presented for the Beijing Winter Olympics, and the translated work Zhuangzi was included in Henan’s foreign publicity series Roots of China · Stories of Henan. The university’s cultural influence keeps expanding.

Looking ahead, Shangqiu Normal University will deliver on the goals set at the 4th Party Congress, striving to build a high-level application-oriented university distinguished by teacher education and coordinated multi-disciplinary development. It will continuously strengthen its core competitiveness, service capacity and social influence, contributing to advancing Chinese modernization in the Central Plains.