Recently, the Ministry of Education has announced the annual filing and approval results of undergraduate majors in general institutions of higher education in 2021. Two undergraduate majors in USST, namely Systems Science and Engineering, and Packaging Design, have been included in the list.
The System Science and Engineering major is established on the basis of the System Science discipline of the Business School of USST. The System Science discipline of USST, one of the earliest established disciplines of its kind in China, started from the Institute of Systems Engineering, Shanghai Institute of Mechanical Engineering established in 1979. Qian Xuesen, a renowned scientist, personally attended the establishment ceremony of the institute and delivered an important speech.
In 1993, it was granted the right to confer master’s degrees. In 1995, it became a key discipline of the former Ministry of Machinery Industry, the earliest key discipline at provincial or ministerial level in the People’s Republic of China. In 2006, it was awarded the right to confer doctoral degrees. In 2008, he became a key discipline of Shanghai. In 2019, a post-doctoral research station for system science was established. The station is now a key construction discipline of a high-level university in Shanghai. The System Science major cultivates high-quality interdisciplinary talents with a solid mathematical foundation, skilled at big data analysis, good at the basic theories and methods of System Science, familiar with interdisciplinary knowledge related to System Science, armed with scientific literacy, systemic thinking, innovative spirit and international vision, and able to solve complex scientific problems in interdisciplinary fields creatively.
Established by the College of Communication and Art Design, the Packaging Design major is a comprehensive discipline combining art and technology which takes the structural modeling, appearance decoration, material application and manufacturing technology of product packaging as the overall research content, and uses the comprehensive knowledge of engineering, culture, art, psychology, marketing and other aspects to explore the relationships between packaging and products, packaging and consumers, as well as packaging and environment. Its features are very distinctive, as it is focused on packaging design innovation, rational function, scientific application of materials and technology, cultivating application-oriented professional talents with firm professional objectives, solid in design foundation, strong in practical ability and high in comprehensive quality.
Supported by a profound disciplinary background, a solid industry foundation and a high-level teaching and research platform, the Packaging Design major runs such (professional) master's degree awarding programs as Art Communication, Arts, and Printing Optical Engineering. Here, the packaging design experimental platforms like National Industrial Design and Construction Highland, National Experimental Teaching Demonstration Center, and National Press and Publication Administration’s Key Lab as well as the industry-university-research cooperation bases and practical experimental bases such as Donnelly Printing Company (Fortune 500 in the world) and Shanghai Jielong Industry Group Corporation Ltd. provide sufficient guarantee and solid support for the whole-process training of packaging design talents. In recent years, students of relevant majors have won high-level awards in such important discipline competitions as “the Jifeng Cup” Transportation Packaging Design Competition, China Packaging Creative Design Competition, National University Student Packaging Structure Design Competition, China Star Design Competition, and the Think Youth Competition, ranking in the forefront of universities at the same level in Shanghai.
In recent years, USST adheres to the fundamental task of the cultivation of virtue and the cultivation of talents, aligning with the national strategic needs, keeping an eye on Shanghai’s socio-economic development, industry needs, adjusting and optimizing the structure of its programs. USST has added 4 new engineering majors including Big Data Robots, Artificial Intelligence, Energy Storage Science and Engineering, and Intelligent Medical Engineering, and updated 3 traditional majors including Rehabilitation Engineering. USST will continue to deepen the in-depth construction of traditional majors, promote the construction of the 4 new majors, and improve the effective dynamic adjustment mechanism of majors, so as to provide strong support for the cultivation of high-quality talents and the construction of a high-level university for itself, improving our talent training ability to promote the construction of the “Four Centers” for Shanghai.
