Established in July 2004, the College of Foreign Languages (the former Foreign Language Department founded in January 1997) has a highly qualified staff including 5 professors, 13 associate professors, one senior lab technician and 2 senior political workers. The teaching staff consists of one doctor, one studying for a doctoral degree and 47 with master¡¯s degrees, of whom 10 have had the experience of studying linguistics or literature in English speaking countries such as Britain, the Unites States, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore. Each year some 4-6 educational experts are selected from these countries and invited to the college to teach.
Consisting of 6 teaching units, including Departments of English, Japanese, University English and Postgraduate Teaching, the college is responsible for teaching foreign languages to over 10,000 of the university¡¯s students. These languages include English, Japanese, Russian and French. Its Resources Centre, founded in 1991, has a collection of over 15,000 books and magazines sourced from foreign countries as well as from China. In addition, the college is equipped with 7 language laboratories, 10 multimedia classrooms and 2 network classrooms. The administration section is made up of the Teaching Office, the Administration Office and the Office of the Youth League Committee.
In the college there is the Hebei Provincial BFT Training Center, which was established in 1999 with the approval of the National Foreign Experts Bureau. Also housed here was the Advanced Teacher Training Center (ATTC) (1992-1996), a project between China and the British Overseas Development Office, which trained a large number of qualified teachers and was awarded First Prize for Education Achievement of Hebei Province. For many years, the college has been in touch with a number of overseas universities and each year it has an exchange program for visiting scholars and students with the University of South Australia and the Adelaide Secondary School of English. This program has played an important role in promoting international cultural exchange and in improving the educational standard of Hebei Polytechnic University.
Over a number of years a group of foreign language disciplines consisting of Cross-Cultural Communication, Systemic Functional Linguistics and English Language and Literature have been established around applied linguistics and translation studies in the college. In 2003 the college was authorized to offer master¡¯s degree programs. In 2003 and 2004, the ¡°Comprehensive English¡± and ¡°Translation¡± courses for English majors were awarded the title of ¡°the Course of Provincial Excellence¡±. The college faculty, dedicated to research, has published 35 books and over 200 academic papers, several of which have won awards.
The current enrollment of the college is 476, including postgraduates, undergraduates and 3-year students. Students in the previous years have passed the National Exam for English Majors (Band 4 and Band 8) with excellent results, the pass rate being 30 percent higher than the national average. A large number have been admitted to China¡¯s most prestigious universities as postgraduates. Moreover, students and teachers continue to participate in the provincial speaking contests. Their participation in such events has led to the achievement of good results either in terms of position or the number of awards gained. Awards of note have been one special prize, 11first prizes, 5 second prizes and 8 third prizes. Students within the college have also done very well in the national English writing and speaking contests.
Adhering to the principle of ¡°broadening knowledge and strengthening basic skills¡±, the college has focused its efforts towards the cultivation of students¡¯ ability to use English in real situations. For this reason its graduates have been well received by society and have been playing very positive roles in a wide variety of workplaces.
The goal of the college is excellence. With this goal in mind, as well as its strong beliefs in diligence and pragmatism, the college is advancing into the future.
