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NEW HAVEN, the United States, April 21 (Xinhua) --
Chinese President Hu Jintao, who is on a state visit to the United States from
April 18 to 21, is expected to give a speech on Friday at Yale University, the
third-oldest higher education institution in the U.S..
Yale University, a member of the
Ivy League, was founded in 1701 as the Collegiate School at the home of Abraham
Pierson, its first rector, in Killingworth, Connecticut.
The school moved to New Haven in 1716, and with the
generous gift from Elihu Yale of nine bales of goods, 417 books, and a portrait
and arms of King George I, it was renamed Yale College in 1718. In 1887 Yale
College became Yale University.
The university now comprises three major academic
components --Yale College (the undergraduate program), the Graduate School of
Arts and Sciences, and ten professional schools.
It also encompasses a wide array of research
organizations, libraries and museums, and administrative and support offices.
Yale currently has some 3,200 faculty members who
teach around 5,200 undergraduate students and 6,000 graduate students. The world
renowned university has students from more than 110 countries.
The 70 undergraduate majors of Yale are primarily
focused on a liberal curriculum, with some 20 percent in the sciences, 35
percent in the social sciences and 45 percent in the arts and humanities.
Many of Yale alumni have become leaders in the
political, economic, scientific and cultural fields in the United States and
around the world. Among its graduates, five have become presidents of the United
States.
Yale also has a long tradition of links with China,
and the first Chinese student, named Yung Wing, graduated from the university in
1854.
Currently, Yale has more than 60 cooperation programs
with more than 45 educational institutions, research organizations and
government departments in 16 Chinese cities.
Meanwhile, Chinese students constitute the largest
group of foreign students in Yale, with the number exceeding 600 in 2004.
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