On June 16, Mr. Norton A. Schwartz, chairman and CEO of Business Executives for National Security (BENS) of the USA, headed a delegation of 9 members to visit Shanghai Administration Institute (SAI) with the purpose of learning the economic development, sustainable development and technology center construction of Shanghai. Prof. Wang Guoping, Executive Vice-President of SAI, welcomed the delegation and hosted the meeting, accompanied by Vice-President Mr. Guo Qingsong.
    Wang briefed Shanghai Administration Institute by generalizing its two features: “1+5” group school-running system and education internationalization. He said that now we were on the main campus. Apart from the main campus, SAI had 5 branch campuses else. The main campus is responsible for universal knowledge and ability training, and the 5 branches cover training in the following government sectors respectively: cultural publicity, politics and laws, urban construction and transport, science & technology as well as education and healthcare, state-owned enterprises and economy. With a population of over 500 staff members and employees, SAI can train more than 50000 person times each year. The trainees can be generally classified into 4 categories, namely, Party cadres, government officials, state-owned enterprises leaders and head of NGOs, among whom there were foreign trainees and MPA students. Besides the main task of training public servants, SAI also serves as a research base and think tank, and it has accomplished a series of major decision-making consulting projects both at the national level and Shanghai local level.
    When talking about internationalization, Wang pointed out that SAI attached great importance to opening-up and international collaboration. Up to now, SAI has established a relatively stable cooperative relationship with more than 30 official training institutions and well-known universities in the world covering all the five continents, among which there are Harvard and Oxford,. By cooperating and sharing resources with them, SAI is now running many programs extensively in business visit, public servants training, research, visiting scholars, bilateral and international conferences, and postgraduates exchange program.
    Mr. Norton A. Schwartz extended his gratitude for SAI’s warm reception. He introduced the members and expressed the main task of this delegation to Shanghai: to learn more about the economic transition development and the construction of technology innovation center of Shanghai.
    After the meeting, Professor Ju Lixin and Professor Chen Yongming of SAI delivered lectures  to the delegation, focusing on the update economic running and sustainable development of Shanghai and the construction of technology innovation center of Shanghai. The delegates also made interactive discussion with the professors in the fields of market economy reform, economic transition and the relationship between SOE and private enterprises.