News & Events

The 2024 Opening of the Exhibition of Student Work in Art, Design, and Aesthetic Foundational Courses at the School of Design

On December 30, 2024, the opening ceremony of the Shanghai Jiao Tong University’s 2024 Exhibition of Student Work in Art, Design, and Aesthetic Foundational Courses at the School of Design was held in the school building’s lobby. The exhibition, themed “Design after Simplicity,” showcased the teaching achievements of 12 professional platform foundation courses and public aesthetic education elective courses at the School of Design. A total of nearly 800 works from 276 students across various majors and 128 freshmen from School of Design were on display, covering a variety of art forms such as sketching, oil painting, watercolor, sculpture, printmaking, machine painting, and AI art. This comprehensive display highlighted the achievements of SJTU’s design teaching reform and the active exploration of aesthetic education practice. University leaders including Party Secretary Yang Zhenbin, Publicity Department Director Hu Hao, Academic Affairs Director Zhang Junliang, Design College Dean Ruan Xing, and Party Committee Secretary Zhang Dandan, along with faculty and student representatives, attended the opening ceremony.

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This exhibition coincided with the seventh anniversary of the school’s founding. Over the past seven years, the school has developed rapidly, and in 2024, it made breakthrough progress in the reform of undergraduate concentrations and of specialized work in aesthetic general education. With the concept of the “integration of science and art,” the school has created two “Grand Design” series of foundational courses: “Art Foundation” and “Design Foundation.” These were conceived to cultivate students’ design thinking. They also aim to “inspire wisdom and touch hearts” through a series of university-wide courses dedicated to aesthetics in practice, tailored to nurture character and enhance students’ aesthetic abilities and overall quality.

Yang Shang, a student from the 2024 Visual Communication Design major, and Ye Shuting, a student from the 2023 Biomedical Engineering major, shared their creative experiences and learning insights in the courses as student representatives. Yang Shang stated that the professional foundation courses integrate theories and methods from interdisciplinary fields, encouraging students to break through their perceptual cocoons and gain a comprehensive understanding of the world from different academic domains. Ye Shuting expressed that the public aesthetic education courses provide a platform for students across the university to perceive, understand, and create beauty, stimulating innovative thinking and promoting emotional touch and self-discovery, enriching personal character.

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Party Secretary Yang Zhenbin emphasized the crucial role of aesthetic education in the educational system. As an important center for such teaching in the university, the Design School has always been at the forefront of aesthetic curricular development, aesthetic immersion on campus, and the beautification of the campus environment. Secretary Yang expressed the hope that the school will continue to radiate its rich professional aesthetic resources to all students, educating with beauty and culture, further promoting the development of the university’s aesthetic education, and making new and greater contributions to the cultivation of well-rounded, new era individuals.

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