Oct. 18, 2013, RUC Vice President Yi Zhihong met with Deputy Vice-Chancellor Sakkie Pretorius of Macquarie University. Members of the delegation include Professor Nick Mansfiel, dean of Higher Degree Research, Lanna Leung, manager of Higher Degree Research Operation and Kristin Fan, manager of Academic Relations, and so on. Vice President Yi expressed a warm welcome to the delegation. Based on the latest disciplinary evaluation run by the Ministry of Education, she gave a thorough introduction to strong disciplines of the University-humanities and social science and its graduate program taught completely in English. Vice President Yi said that the two universities were going to sign agreements on student and faculty exchanges, expecting to promote interscholastic communication. Deputy Vice-Chancellor Pretorius expressed gratitude to RUC’s warm reception. He introduced, Macquarie University has been paying much attention on graduate and doctoral programs whereby most candidates are able to obtain scholarship and financial aid for living expenses. There are over 5,300 Chinese students in Macquarie University at present. The University expects more RUC students to seek study there. He hoped the two sides could make continuing efforts on joint Ph.D. programs. Li Yanli, director of Graduate School Training and Management Office, and Sheng Xiwen, deputy director of International Office were in attendance. Established in 1974, Macquarie University is located in the southwest of Sydney industrial district. It’s a public university and composed of four schools. With over 33,000 students and 2,221 teaching faculty, the University ranks the fourth in Sydney. It has the largest amount of exchange programs and among the top-5 universities which possess most scientific research funds.