On July 18, the Qingdao International Campus of the University of International Business and Economics, with a total investment of about 3.15 billion yuan, pressed the "termination key" for construction.

　　Recently, the Government Service Hotline Office of the General Office of the Qingdao Municipal People's Government in Shandong confirmed this news when replying to a netizen's question. Previously, the project partner, Qingdao West Coast New Area, stated that due to the impact of the Ministry of Education's policy on universities running schools in other locations, the originally planned school-running plan could not be implemented.

　　This also brings the topic of universities running schools in other locations back into public view. The reporter noted that in recent years, many universities have suspended or shut down newly built campuses and graduate schools in other locations, and the trend of running schools in other locations is gradually changing.

　　Multiple universities ordered to stop running schools in other locations

　　Like the Qingdao International Campus of the University of International Business and Economics, the Qingdao Campus of Beihang University has also pressed the "termination key."

　　In January this year, Du Lejiang, executive deputy director of the Qingdao Blue Valley Administration, when replying about the construction of the campus, said that the Qingdao Municipal Party Committee and Municipal Government are soliciting opinions and plan to terminate the agreement signed with Jimo District to build the Qingdao Campus of Beihang University.

　　In recent years, branch campuses or cooperative school-running projects of many domestic universities, such as the Shenzhen Campus of Wuhan University, the Lanzhou College of the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the Shenzhen Jilin University-University of Queensland, have all been reported to be halted. Among them, when the Gansu Provincial Department of Education responded to a netizen's question about the construction of the Lanzhou College of the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, it said that the Ministry of Education clearly gave feedback that it "does not support nor encourage running campuses in other locations."

　　The same is true for graduate schools. As early as 2022, universities such as Southwest Jiaotong University and Harbin Institute of Technology successively revoked multiple off-site graduate schools.

　　Judging from the cities chosen by universities for running schools in other locations, they are mainly concentrated in economically developed areas such as Qingdao and Shenzhen. In addition, very few universities outside the central and western regions go to the central and western regions to run schools.

　　Why universities running schools in other locations is being tightened

　　Behind the termination of off-site school running by many universities is the tightening of relevant policies on universities running schools in other locations in recent years.

　　In July 2021, the Ministry of Education issued the "Opinions on the Establishment of Higher Education Institutions during the 14th Five-Year Plan Period," which clearly stated that "universities are not encouraged or supported to run schools across provinces in other locations, especially strictly controlling universities affiliated with ministries and commissions and universities in the central and western regions from running schools across provinces in the eastern region; in principle, applications to establish cross-province off-site campuses shall not be approved."

　　The above opinions also required that existing off-site campuses of universities be gradually cleaned up and standardized on the principle of stability and orderliness.

　　Subsequently, education authorities in many places, including Guangdong and Shandong, issued relevant notices to follow up.

　　In recent years, the Ministry of Education has also pointed out many problems in off-site school running when replying to suggestions from representatives and members.

　　"Off-site campuses find it difficult to effectively share the original teaching and research resources and campus cultural resources, and their educational accumulation is weak"; "the expansion of school scale and regional layout has led to a gradual decline in the effect of standardized and unified management and a decline in the level of internal governance of universities"; "diluting the original high-quality educational resource brands of universities"... the Ministry of Education mentioned this in a reply to a suggestion from a deputy to the National People's Congress.

　From scale expansion to connotative development

　　Chu Zhaohui, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Educational Sciences, analyzed to the reporter that previously some universities were keen on running schools in other locations, mainly hoping to develop through scale expansion, which in a sense was a product of the extensional development of higher education.

　　"But the extensional expansion development model is unsustainable." Chu Zhaohui pointed out that after some universities run schools in other locations, they will find that there are many problems in operating costs, teaching quality and level, and efficiency is relatively low, so it is impossible to achieve good development in higher education competition.

　　In his view, China's higher education has entered the stage of connotative development centered on improving quality, and it is not appropriate to blindly expand scale. Campuses are not better the larger they are or the more the better; rather, they should be made as refined and detailed as possible, improve quality and efficiency, and strengthen connotative construction.

　　Where should universities go in running schools in other locations? Chu Zhaohui believes that "not encouraging or supporting universities to run schools across provinces in other locations" corresponds to the disorderly state that appeared in some universities' off-site school running during a certain period, and is a policy adjustment made in response to existing problems.

　　The reporter noted that when the Ministry of Education previously replied to a suggestion from a deputy to the National People's Congress "on requesting the state to coordinate the construction of high-level universities in regional central cities," it listed the fundamental problems existing in running schools in other locations. The reply pointed out that before reasonable solutions to the above problems are found in terms of systems and mechanisms, in principle, universities are not encouraged to cooperate in running schools in other locations.