A western view on Westlake University’s way to reform China’s education system

In just over 40 years, China went through a transformation from a developing country to the second largest economy in the world and opened its doors for economic globalization. Having recurrently strengthened an even more globally connected vision for instance through large-scale infrastructure projects, a critical ingredient for dedicated implementation is well-educated human talent. After a successful talent acquisition focus, establishing a more solid and contemporary education system targeted towards training “own talents” according to customized values and philosophies may gradually gain momentum in the upcoming years. As a natural consequence, Westlake University, a new non-profit and private university designed to resemble American elite universities to educate the next generation of innovators embedded in world-class research, has been founded recently in Hangzhou, Zhejiang. In this chapter, we provide a brief overview of the Chinese education system and then introduce Westlake University’s core values and its vision to become the essential “bridge” to connect China with the West. We then analyze the opportunities and challenges ahead when a newly born “Westlake philosophy” meets China’s traditional education system shaped by a long history and culture. In the end, we provide our own views on the Westlake University concept and the way ahead.