Tonghua Normal University is located in Tonghua City of Jilin province, at the foot of Changbai Mountain, beside the Yalu River, and adjacent to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. The university is environed by hills and the surrounding scenery is magnificently beautiful. The campus of the university is characterized by Changbaishan botony, covered with every kind of Changbaishan trees and plants. The beauty of the campus lies in its Changbaishan-styled simplicity and roughness.
Tonghua Normal University was founded in 1958. It was promoted to an undergraduate university and was renamed Tonghua Normal University in 1978. It covers an area of 680,000 square meters, 208,500 square meters of which are floor space. The fixed assets are worth 462 million yuan RMB. There are 987,000 books and 1,508 different kinds of domestic and foreign periodicals in the library. The university has 59 laboratories, 25 training rooms, 54 off campus praxis sites and 53 professional practice bases.
Now the university comprises 15 colleges and departments and 42 majors which cover eight disciplines. It also has another two non-major departments, Department of Ideological and Political Theory and Department of Public English as well as College of Adults and Continuing Education, Network Information Center and eight scientific research institutes (centers). Currently, the university has a stuff of 704, 536 full-time professional teachers, including 224 professors or associate professors. 487 teachers have Ph. D or M.A. degrees. The university engages foreign language experts from Britain, the U.S., Japan, Korea and other countries all year round. There are 11,000 full-time students from 26 provinces and municipalities.
The university has two national characteristic specialty construction sites; six provincial characteristic specialties; three provincial primary discipline; eleven provincial high-quality courses; 39 excellent provincial courses; four provincial excellent teams of teachers; one key provincial laboratory. Meanwhile, there is a key High Education Humanity Research Base of Jilin province --- Koguryo and Northeast Nationalities Research Center; two Special Cultural Research Base of Jilin Province --- Changbai Mountain Culture Research Base, Koguryo Research base; a Manchu Nationality Folk Fine Arts Research Center.
The university has a tremendous scientific research faculty. Over the past five years, there have been 2,011 theses published in journals of the provincial level or higher lever, 680 of which were published in core journals and 154 were registered in SCI and EI. It has also published 14 academic works and 68 textbooks. It has been approved for 17 state-level scientific research projects; two state-level teaching research projects; 299 provincial level scientific research projects; 33 provincial level teaching research projects; 566 scientific research projects at or above university level. Meanwhile, the university has received 99 rewards for the scientific research from the province and the bureaus; 4 provincial Excellent Teaching Awards; 10 invention patents. The university has successfully bid one item in the catalogue of world representative intangible cultural heritage; two items in the catalogue of national representative intangible cultural heritage; 15 items in the catalogue of provincial representative intangible cultural heritage.
Looking ahead, Tonghua Normal University is potentially growing. It has formulated the “Twelfth Five-Year” development plan and has been carried out comprehensively with a view of scientific development. Reform is the university’s propelling force. It focuses on teaching, primarily teaching quality and strives toward becoming a teaching-focused university with high-level teacher-centered education, multi-disciplinary development and unique characteristics.
Warmly welcome international academic experts to teach, to deliver lectures and to conduct researches in every field; and welcome the international students to persue their studies in Tonghua Normal University.