Tongji SEM

About Us

Tongji University has a long history and outstanding reputation. It is one of the earliest national universities in China. After more than 100 years of development, Tongji University has become a comprehensive, research-oriented, and international university with distinctive characteristics and huge influence at home and abroad, and its comprehensive strength ranks among the top universities in China.
First offering programs in Economics and Management in 1956, Tongji University was one of the earliest universities in China to launch such programs. Tongji University’s School of Economic Management was founded in 1984 and merged with its Business School to become the School of Economics and Management (hereinafter referred to as SEM) in 1998. SEM has been accredited by international and domestic organizations such as AACSB, EQUIS, CAMEA, and PMI-GAC. Its Management Science and Engineering discipline received an A+ rating in the Ministry of Education’s discipline evaluation; its Business Administration discipline received an A+ rating in the Times Higher Education China Subject Ratings; its Management and Business Administration ranked among the top 100 in the Shanghai Ranking’s Global Ranking of Academic Subjects and the top five in the ranking of academic subjects of Chinese mainland universities; its Economics and Business discipline entered the top 1% of Essential Science Indicators (ESI) global rankings. All undergraduate majors of SEM have been selected as national first-class undergraduate majors.
Building upon its stellar development over the past four decades, SEM is now injecting new momentum into its traditional disciplines through digital-intelligent, green, and integrated development. It is also comprehensively advancing “AI+” in talent cultivation, discipline construction, scientific research, and platform building. SEM focuses on interdisciplinary integration, deepening international cooperation, and creating new quality productive forces in economics and management disciplines. By aligning itself with the country’s major strategic and social needs, SEM strives to be a leader in the management of national major and complex projects, an explorer of high-quality economic development, a promoter of enterprise innovation and transformation, and a practitioner of social governance modernization. In pursuing the aforementioned actions, SEM is taking the initiative to serve the country’s remarkable self-reliance and strength in science and technology and high-quality economic development. In the future, with the goal of moving more rapidly to cultivate top innovators, SEM will formulate new plans and implement new initiatives to further contribute to the high-quality development of world-class universities with Chinese characteristics.

Disciplines and Programs

SEM explores new models and pathways for cultivating top-tier innovators. In recent years, SEM has stepped into strategic emerging and interdisciplinary fields and dynamically adjusted its program offerings to strengthen their integration with computer science, data science, mathematics, and other related disciplines. It has also established dual-degree programs and innovation pilot zones. SEM has entered into agreements with multiple Hong Kong universities to facilitate integrated undergraduate and postgraduate education in fostering talents in digital intelligence. This has also allowed for better resource sharing and other complementary advantages between Shanghai and Hong Kong. In addition, SEM has strengthened the deep integration of practical teaching and theoretical learning with cutting-edge technologies such as financial large models introduced and built through industry-education integration. Furthermore, Tongji SEM students continue to improve their innovation capabilities, strengthen their comprehensive practical skills, and win higher honors in various competitions.

Faculty

Tongji SEM has a strong faculty team and a first-class academic team including academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, scholars funded by the Chang Jiang Scholars Program and the National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars, etc. Faculty members of the School have won the Special Contribution Award of the 7th Management Science Award, and were nominated as World’s Top 2% Scientists by Stanford University, with some being listed as Highly Cited Researchers with international influence. Their contributions in professional fields have been widely recognized both at home and abroad.

Scientific Research

SEM adheres to technological innovation in four aspects: the world’s cutting-edge science and technology; the main economic battlefields; the state’s major demands; and the people’s lives and health. SEM empowers the innovative development of disciplines with AI, implements a strategic transformation toward “digital-intelligent, green, and integrated” disciplines, leverages AI’s leading role in scientific research and disciplinary development, and promotes reform in scientific research paradigms and the leapfrog development of disciplines. In the meantime, SEM is strengthening its advantageous disciplines, stepping into emerging interdisciplinary fields, systematically advancing basic research and organized scientific research, and devoting itself to applying high-quality research outcomes to new fields and arenas. This is all being done to serve the development of new quality productive forces. In recent years, SEM’s faculty members have published research papers in top journals such as Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) and Journal of Political Economy (JPE). In the UTD Top 100 Business School Research Rankings, SEM is among the top 10 Chinese mainland universities, which showcases the globally leading research capabilities in its economics and management disciplines.

Social Services

By exerting its disciplinary advantages, SEM assembles big teams, builds large platforms, and undertakes major tasks to serve the innovative development of national and regional economies. Its teams have broken through the bottlenecks of a group of core technologies to develop a new-generation intelligent flight recovery system that contributes to the smart transformation of civil aviation. The teams focus on cities’ digital transformation and intelligent social governance and participate in the platform development of the National Comprehensive Base for Intelligent Social Governance Experiment (Yangpu, Shanghai). Furthermore, the teams provided smart construction and intelligent operation and maintenance management services for complex projects such as Shanghai East Hospital in Pudong and Taiyuan Metro Line 2; presided over the overall progress control of construction and operation preparations for Beijing Daxing International Airport; provided technology research and consulting services for over 30 major national or regional projects including Xiong’an New Area, Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge, Qianhai, Shenzhen of Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and Xuhui Riverside’s large urban underground facilities.

Industry-education Integration

SEM comprehensively promotes integration between characteristic disciplines and industries and fosters a new open innovation ecosystem of in-depth industry-education integration featuring multi-party collaboration. SEM implements achievements from collaboration with leading AI companies, Fortune Global 500 companies, domestic specialized and innovative enterprises, and European innovation bases in areas of practice and training bases, first-class course development, high-end forums, national competitions, case days, enterprise visits, and mobile classrooms. It has set up various university-enterprise cooperation platforms. Furthermore, SEM unlocks talents’ potential for innovation and creation, focuses on organizational learning and innovation ecosystem construction integrated with large models, innovation in market-oriented green technologies, digital and green transformation of enterprises, and internationalization strategies of Chinese enterprises, and furnishes overall solutions for Chinese enterprises’ transformation and upgrading and international competitiveness enhancement.

International Exchange and Cooperation

Rooted in Shanghai to have the whole world in view, SEM continues to enhance its international cooperation. It has signed cooperation agreements with over 100 renowned institutions in nearly 30 countries including Germany, U.S., France, UK, and Italy, offering study abroad opportunities to nearly 1,000 students every year. With over 200 English-taught courses across bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral levels, SEM fosters an international learning and cultural environment for students all over the world. In 2024, the Tongji SEM German-Sino Center was established in Berlin. With Tongji University’s profound strengths in Sino-German cooperation as well as high-quality academic resources of Tongji SEM, the center will develop a gateway with impact for Sino-German exchange and cooperation between academia and industry.