Shanghai Business School (SBS), formerly known as the East China Branch of the Tax Administration School of the Central Government (founded in 1950), is a public application-oriented undergraduate institution of higher education with a distinctive focus on business studies. The school has adhered to a “business-rooted and application-centered” education philosophy, and upheld the school motto of “strive for virtue and erudition, devote to economic prosperity and social responsibility”. The school is devoted to developing “applied, innovative, and international” school-running features, cultivating high-quality application-oriented business talents with professional attainment, practical ability, innovative spirit, international view, and a strong sense of social responsibility, and building a high-level application-oriented business school.
Currently the school has three campuses (Fengpu Campus, Xuhui Campus, and Guoquan Road Campus) and one school point at Fuzhou Road, and boasts nearly 10,000 full-time students. It has established ten secondary level colleges, and offered 28 regular undergraduate specialties, two Sino-foreign cooperative specialties, and two junior college specialties for 2021. To be specific, its business administration, hospitality management, e-commerce, and international economics and trade are national-level first-class undergraduate specialties; its finance, computer science and technology, marketing, logistics management are Shanghai municipal-level first-class undergraduate specialties; its taxation and eight other specialties are application-oriented undergraduate experimental specialties in institutions of higher learning under Shanghai municipality; its business administration, hospitality management, e-commerce, and marketing have passed ACBSP international certification.
The school attaches great importance to application-oriented teaching staff construction, and empowers the cultivation of high-quality application-oriented business talents. Currently, the school has a total of nearly 800 teaching and administrative staff members, including nearly 500 full-time teachers, one expert enjoying special government subsidy from the State Council, two teachers elected as members of the Ministry of Education's Steering Committee on Higher Educational Institutions, one “Leading Talent in Shanghai”, and ten winners of the Shanghai Municipal-level Outstanding Teacher Award and the Baosteel Outstanding Teacher Award. It has also launched 64 Ministry of Education industry-university cooperative education projects and developed a national-level experimental teaching demonstration center. In the past five years, SBS has also won a total of 13 first and second prizes of the municipal teaching achievement award, and offered 54 municipal-level key, top-quality, and model courses. Moreover, the school has established a whole-process, academic honor-based dynamic incentive system composed of freshmen scholarship, awareness scholarship, president scholarship, enterprise scholarship, etc. The students of SBS have won more than 130 national awards in the National Selection Competition for the WorldSkills Competition, the “Challenge Cup”, and many other disciplinary (specialty) competitions. SBS also has a stable graduate employment rate of above 98%, topping the list of colleges and universities in Shanghai.
By continuously deepening the connotations of discipline construction and engaging in comprehensive strategic cooperation with Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, the school aims to accelerate disciplinary special zone construction and create a business discipline system based on based on applied economics and business administration and characterized by interdisciplinary coordinated development. Its applied economics is a class-II plateau discipline at Shanghai municipal level; its business communication is a key discipline selected by Shanghai Municipal Education Commission; and its business administration has been included under Shanghai Higher Education Institutions First-Class Discipline (Class B) Construction Program. Over the past five years, the school has undertaken more than 70 scientific research projects at or above the provincial or ministerial level (subsidized by the National Social Science Foundation of China, the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the Ministry of Education Humanities and Social Science Fund, and so forth), and won 15 provincial or ministerial-level scientific research awards, including Shanghai Municipality Research Achievements Award for Decision-making Consultation.
Focusing on national and local strategic demands and major industrial demands, the school has deepened its comprehensive strategic cooperation with Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce, and launched a series of commercial (business) application research and consultation services. It has also developed multiple municipal-level scientific research bases and platforms, such as Shanghai Institute of Commercial Development, University Think Tank of Shanghai, Shanghai Social Science Innovative Research Base, Key Research Institute of Humanities and Social Sciences at Universities of Shanghai, and University Knowledge Service Platform of Shanghai. It has also received replies from provincial and ministerial leaders concerning 67 research achievements for business decision-making consultation in the past five years. The MOFCOM Training Base for International Business Officials (Shanghai), established by the Ministry of Commerce at SBS, has offered training to a cumulative total of 4,400 business officials from more than 100 countries (regions) worldwide.
Clinging to the principle of open schooling, the school never ceases to enhance its international reputation and influence. For the purpose of introducing high-quality business education resources, it has developed strategic cooperation with EHL and Hengshan Group, and promoted the construction of a first-class, world-renowned college of hospitality management. It has successively launched cooperation and exchanges with nearly 90 research institutions and institutions of higher learning in the US, the UK, Australia, and many other countries and regions, initiated the founding of the “Belt and Road” International Business Education Alliance, led the formation of the International Alliance of High-end Business Think Tanks, and established its Overseas Education Base in Central and Eastern Europe.
The school lays emphasis on the inheritance of traditional commercial culture and the cultivation of the core socialist values. It has built Chinese Commercial Culture Exhibition Hall and Shanghai-style Commercial Culture Research Institute, and produced a range of business culture-themed feature films, such as Centennial History of Commerce in Shanghai, Centennial History of Retails, and Centennial History of Trade. The school has also undertaken the interview and selection activities of the Chinese Poetry Competition (Seasons II and III) in Shanghai. In addition, the school has received many honors, including the “Silver Prize of the 2nd Chinese Youth Volunteer Service Project Competition” sponsored by the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League of China, “National Defense Education Characteristic School Elected by the Ministry of Education”, “2019 Excellent Organization Award of Chinese Classics Recitation, Writing, and Speaking Contest Sponsored by the Ministry of Education”, and the “1st Civilized Campus in Shanghai”.
The school has exerted itself to create a smart campus, developed multiple smart applications based on “banking service system” and other service modes and mindsets, and taken the lead in logistics information technology construction and services. The major honors it has won include “Excellent Demonstration Unit for Logistics Information Technology Construction at Institutions of Higher Learning Nationwide”, “Award for Top 10 Innovative Applications in Smart City Construction of Shanghai”, and “Bench-marking School for Education Information Technology Applications in Shanghai”.
2021 is the starting year of the “14th Five-year Plan” period. Standing at a new historical starting point, the school will further innovate its school-running pattern, effectively strengthen collaborative innovation in business education, and actively serve and join the new development pattern, striving to turn SBS into a high-level application-oriented business school with distinctive characteristics.
