At 7:45 of May 4th, an international train of No. K3 slowly went out of Beijing Railway Station, which indicated the commencement of the first 18-day “Innovative International Express Mobile Classroom” of Tongji. The mobile classroom will pass Moscow and St. Petersburg for a short stay, and reach the destination--Helsinki, capital of Finland a week later. This is an important inter-school exchange program since the establishment of “Tongji Sino-Finnish Centre” jointly founded by Tongji and Aalto University of Finland.

Prof. Pei Gang, President of Tongji attended the Shanghai Mobilization before the expedition. Lars Backström, Finnish Ambassador, Dong Xia, Deputy Minister of International Liaison Department of Mission Central and Deputy Secretary of China Youth Federation, and Li Xin, Vice president of Tongji went to Beijing Station and saw the students off on the morning of May 4th.

Students attending this mobile classroom included 72 undergraduates and masters from Tongji together with some of “Excellent Talent Program Alliance” . Among them, 62 students are from a number of departments at Tongji with various academic backgrounds, and 10 of them are excellent students with comprehensive quality but in financial difficulties, who are funded by Tongji university. The other 10 students are from some “Excellent Talent Program Alliance” such as Harbin Institute of Technology, Beijing Institute of Technology, Tianjin University and South China University of Technology.

This mobile classroom sets up a total of four “Innovation Workshops” and the students are divided into four groups. Project teams will take the advantage of multi-disciplinary integration of group members and carry out group discussions and self-designs, finally complete 4 business projects proposed by Haier Group. These four projects are “Healthy Residence Solutions and Innovative Product Research Based on Low-carbon”, “Smart Residence Solutions and Product Innovations Based on Users’ Individual Needs”, “Research on sensual experience of Home Appliance looks”, “Lifestyle Research and Modular Home Design”. Group members of every team conducted preliminary research and discussions of their respective projects. The overall research achievements will be displayed in Helsinki.

According to the itinerary, the mobile classroom will have a short stay in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Our students will visit Moscow University and St. Petersburg Polytechnic University and carry out a cultural exchange with students from Russia.

“International Express Mobile Classroom” will reach the destination—Helsinki, Capital of Finland on May 10th. Our students will first pay a visit to Aalto University, the strategic partner of Tongji on May 11th and attend the opening ceremony of Arts Masters Exhibition of Helsinki in the evening. There will be a special section named “Tongji On Tracks (TOT) of Tongji innovative Mobile Classroom” in the exhibition with a number of booths like Time Flow, Train Tracks, TOT Uniform booth, Intensive Space Booth and Haier Subject Booth.

From May 12th, “China Week” will start in Helsinki. Chinese students will conduct a live show of Chinese culture like Chinese Tea and design works rich in Chinese characteristics completed by Tongji students. We will hold a “Tongji Day” on May 14th. Our students will fly back to China on May 18th, the day following the closing ceremony.

At the end of this event, students who have good performance in the mobile classroom and successfully complete the research subjects will get corresponding credits of selective courses and Haier Scholarship.

Our school leaders said, the launch of “Innovative International Express Mobile Classroom” is a new trial of Tongji innovation education, which calls on self-study and student-led innovation design. This is also an innovation exploration on how to further promote the international cooperation between Chinese and foreign universities.

This event has been greatly supported by Ministry of International Cooperation and Exchanges and Mission Central. “From the bank of Huangpu River to bank of Volga River”, the exchange activity with Russia was included in the framework of Sino-Russia Friendship and sub-committee of Youth Work of Peace and Development Council. “From Oriental Pearl to Baltic Pearl ”, the exchange activity with Finland was incorporated into the framework of “Sino-EU Youth Exchange Year”.

The mobile classroom would be passing through Moscow, St.Petersburg for a short stay, and would arrive to the destination-Helsinki, Finland one week later. It is an important intercollegiate exchange event after the establishment of “Tongji-Finland Center”, which is co-founded by our university and Aalto University, Finland.