Brief Introduction
Profile
The College of Environment and Planning (CEP) at Henan University is the successor of the Department of Geography of Zhongzhou University established in 1923. Professor Jinglan Feng, a distinguished geologist and Academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences was the first dean of CEP. After years of continuous efforts, CEP has developed to become a comprehensive and interdisciplinary college featuring with Geography as main body, covering Environmental Science, Ecology, Science and Technology of Surveying and Mapping, and Regional Economics.
Organizational Structure
CEP is composed of four departments: Department of Geographical Sciences, Department of Regional and Urban Sciences, Department of Geographic Information Sciences, and Department of Environmental Sciences. The research and educational institutes established by CEP include the National Experimental Teaching Demonstration Center of Environment and Planning, the Laboratory of Geospatial Technology for the Middle and Lower Yellow River Regions (Key Laboratory of the Ministry of Education), Research Institute of Yellow River Civilization & Sustainable Development (Key Research Base of Humanities and Social Science of the Ministry of Education), the Middle and Lower Yellow River Regions Science Data Sharing Platform of National Earth System Science Data Sharing Infrastructure, Regional Economy Research Center of Henan Province(Key Research Base of Humanities and Social Science of Henan Province), the Big Spatio-Temporal Data Industry Technology Research Institute of Henan Province, the Integrative Prevention of Air Pollution and Ecological Safety Key Laboratory of Henan Province, Henan Engineering Research Center for Control and Remediation of Heavy Metal Pollution in Soil, Digital Geographic Technology International Joint Laboratory of Henan Province.
Discipline Construction
CEP offers doctoral degrees of a first-level discipline in Geography, as well as post-doctoral research program. Besides, there are five doctoral programs of second-level disciplines, including Physical Geography, Human Geography, Cartography and Geographic Information System, Economic Geography, Remote Sensing Information Science and Technology. The school also offers two doctoral programs of second-level disciplines and post-doctoral studies in Regional Economics and Ecology. Under the classification of second-level disciplines, CEP offers 15 mater programs such as Curriculum and Pedagogy (Geography), Land Resources Management, and Environmental Sciences. It also offers bachelor degrees in Geography and Science, Natural Geography and Resource Environment, Human Geography and Urban and Rural Planning, Geographic Information Science, and Environmental Science. In these programs, Geography, is a provincial priority discipline; Human Geography and Regional Economics are the key disciplines of Henan Province. In the first-level discipline evaluation conducted by the Ministry of Education, Geography of CEP was ranked 11thand 8thin 2012 and 2009, respectively.
Faculty & Stuff
CEP has a faculty of 136 members, including 39 professors, 36 associate professors, 1 academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering (CAE), 1academician of Inter-national Eurasian Academy of Sciences (IEAS),2adjunctAcademicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) or CAE, 1 Yangtze River Scholar,2 Distinguished Young Scholars of National Science Foundation of China (NSFC), 3 first and second level for the National of Talent Project,2 first batch leading talent in Ten Thousand Talent Program, 2talent with Outstanding Contribution Award, 9experts entitled to special government allowances of the State Council, 3 National Excellent Teachers, 16distinguished professors of Henan University and Henan Province, 18overseas visiting professors, 29 PhD supervisors, and 111 with doctorate degrees.
Talent Training
Aiming to strengthen the moral education and talent cultivation, CEP is focusing on fostering high-quality and inter-disciplinary scholars with social responsibility, innovative spirit and practical ability. Three projects(e.g. Integration and Innovation of Regional Model and Information System) won the National Excellent Teaching Achievement Awards. Three textbooks (e.g. Economic Geography, Integration and Application of Regional Model) won Excellent Textbook Award of National Tertiary Institutes. Two courses (e.g. WEB GIS) are National Quality Courses and six (e.g. Physical Geography) are Provincial Quality Courses. The geographical science teaching team is at the national level. Geography Science is a national characteristic discipline and state professional reform pilot discipline. Two professors won Young Teacher Award of FokYing-Tong Education Foundation. More than30 National Undergraduate Innovation Entrepreneurship Programs were approved. Students were awarded a silver medal in the second China "Internet +" Undergraduate Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition, and a second-place prize in the second China National Geographic Science Exhibition Competition，and also won the 2nd place of the video competition, International Society for Digital Earth.
Scientific Research
Targeting on the frontiers of geography, to promote the development of Middle and Lower Yellow River Regions and Henan Province and to help the construction of Central Plains Economic Zone, Central Henan Urban Agglomeration and Zhengzhou Airport Economy Zone, 5 research orientations of human geography, economic geography, Geographic Information System, environmental geography and ecological geography are developed. More than 70 national scientific research projects were granted,48 research rewards of provincial, ministerial and national level were awarded (including the first-place prize of Henan Province Science and Technology Progress of “the Research and Application of Key Technologies of Earth System Science Data Sharing project” in 2013)and more than 180 articles in SCI, SSCI, EI and other Chinese top journals were published in recent years. CEP has been ranked the eighth in ActaGeographicaSinica80 years’ publication number and the seventh in Geographical Research32 years’ publication number among all the Chinese universities and institutes.
Social Services
The mission of CEP is to serve the construction of economy, society and ecology, and to promote the regional sustainable development. According to the national major strategic demands of“The Belt and Road”, “targeted poverty alleviation”, “big data pilot zone”, “the core area of grain production”, “Central Plains Economic Region”, “China (Henan) Pilot Free Trade Zone” and others, CEP has contributed to assisting government in policy formulation, policy consultation and technical support. To deepen integration of production, study and research, CEP has completed more than 500 projects, including strategic planning for regional development, urban system, land use, tourism, eco-environmental protection planning, etc. More than 3000 on-job postgraduates have graduated from CEP. CET is one of the national science education bases. It has opened nature museum, virtual reality laboratory and astronomical observatory to the public for popularization purpose. The contribution of CEP has been highly appraised by the national leaders such as President Xi Jinping.
Cultural Inheritance and Innovation
CEP devotes to promote cultural inheritance and innovation and to enhance cultural influence. Taking Yellow River civilization as the cultural feature and Yellow River basin as the regional feature, CEP has established Yellow River Civilization and Sustainable Development Research Center, the Yellow River branch of the Geographical Society of China (GSC) and other institutions to conduct the omni-directional, multi-level, and wide range comprehensive research on Yellow River civilization, and to develop the research and innovation platform. Many activities such as the high-level forum on Yellow River science and the survival and development of the Earth on the Earth Day of April 22nd were successfully held, which have made contribution to sustainable development of the Yellow River area, the inheritance of the Yellow River civilization, and the construction of modern civilization. CEP has undertaken major research projects like the spatial differentiation and evolution mechanism of the specialized village in the Yellow River basin, and published books such as The Development and Harnessing of the Yellow River in the Past 60 Years. The college also won the Second-place Prize of Outstanding Achievements in the Eighth Session of University Campus Culture Construction held by Ministry of Education, National Advanced Grassroots CPC Organization and Advanced Collectives of Henan Province Education System.
International Exchange and Cooperation
CEP has established exchanges and cooperation with overseas institutes to enhanceits international influence. The cooperative partners include the America’s Environment Systems Research Institute (ESRI), the University of Texas at Dallas (UTD), University of Miami (UM) and so on. International Joint Laboratory of Digital Geospatial Technology in Henan is also set up.18 overseas professors are engaged and 10 full English or bilingual courses are set up in CEP. Above 50 well-known foreign experts such as Micheal Goodchild, an academician of United States National Academy of Sciences, have built cooperation with CEP. 100 of teachers and excellent students are sent to study aboard and numbers of international conferences are held by the college. Two overseas professors of Ronald Briggs and Milan Konecny have won the Yellow River Friendship Award of The People’s Government of Henan Province in 2013 and 2014, respectively.