SISU hosts the Asia Pacific Working Group of CIUTI. SISU's Graduate Institute of Interpreting and Translation (GIIT) is a leading translation and interpreting institute in Asia. GIIT offers graduate interpreting and translation programs on all the six official languages of the United Nations and has been awarded the highest ranking by the International Association of Conference Interpreters (AIIC). GIIT is the only conference interpreter training institute of China (including Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan) to rank among the global Top 15, ranking No. 1 for the English-Chinese pair. SISU graduated the first batch of doctors in foreign languages and literatures in the People's Republic of China. Currently, SISU offers programs on 40 languages, embracing all the major modern languages of the world, as well as courses on many classical languages. SISU is actively preparing to offer new programs and new courses on strategic languages to consolidate our portfolio of non-commonly spoken languages. SISU's Research Center for Foreign Language Strategies is one of the first research bases and think-tank units of China State Language Commission. SISU publishes 12 academic journals of which seven are CSSCI source journals or collections. Among them, the Journal of Foreign Languages is funded by the National Social Science Fund of China and covered by MLA International Bibliography, and it is the only foreign language journal among the "Top 30 Social Science Journals of China". Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press, a publishing house of SISU, is one of the most prestigious publishers of foreign language books in China.
SISU began with languages and literatures and it now spans five disciplines: literature, education, economics, management and law. It is the only one of China's foreign language universities that grants Ph. D. degrees in three first-level disciplines: foreign languages and literatures, political science and business administration, in foreign languages and literatures, and political science. SISI has many national and provincial/ministerial key humanities and social science research bases, including the Middle East Studies Institute, the Center for EU Studies, the Center for Russian Studies, the Center for British Studies, the Center for Asian-African Studies, and the Center for Latin American Studies. In 2016, SISU's Middle East Studies Institute, the Research Center for Global Public Opinion of China, and the Research Center for Foreign Language Strategies became the first “CTTI Source Think Tank” units. SISU has just launched its "Shanghai Academy of Global Governance and Area Studies" which will inform global governance and national development through governance and area studies, participation in the global knowledge and discourse system, engagement in language policy planning, and global public opinion research. We aim to create a first-class disciplinary innovation platform.
SISU has established partnerships with more than 360 universities, cultural and educational institutions and international organizations from 56 countries and regions around the world. 43% of SISU's undergraduate students have overseas study experience; SISU has partnered with universities of Germany, France and Spain for joint graduate student education. Each year, SISU recruits about 4,000 international students from more than 100 countries around the world, ranking first in the country. SISU has co-organized international academic conferences with academic institutions from the United States, Canada, Lebanon, Morocco, Uzbekistan, Japan and South Korea. SISU implements an "external expertise attraction" plan to build an internationalized faculty and promote international research cooperation. 80% of SISU's faculty have overseas experience; foreign experts are now 1/4 of our full-time faculty.
