China Planning Network (CPN)

Knowledge Co-Production: CPN Cross-Cultural Education Roundtable

CPN Open House: World Planning School Admission Info Session

Beijing July 15, 2008

CPN Open House Theme:

Chinese students and western schools have long suffered in the enrolling process: students and faculties have to accept and offer the studentship without even seeing each other. CPN has undertaken to organize series of Open House in order to change this situation. The 1st CPN World Planning Schools Admission Open House was hold in Beijing in 2006, gathering over 50 professors of 25 top planning schools from all over the world to meet with Chinese students and introduce their faculty, research, education programs and scholarship opportunities. The Open House was warmly welcome by both Chinese students and western faculties. We are continuing this effort this year together with the CPN Cross-Cultural Education Roundtable.

CPN Cross-Cultural Education Roundtable Theme:

The Roundtable is being sponsored by China Planning Network (CPN) as part of the China Week 2008. Prof. Bish Sayal from MIT will chair the Roundtable. There has been a great number of planning education interchanges between students and faculty from universities in China and the West since 1980. The Roundtable would review the assumptions underlying cross-cultural planning educational interchanges in general, and joint design studios in particular, with students and faculty from universities in China and the U.S.  

One key assumption underlies joint educational exercises: that they are intellectually more complex and rewarding than standard studios because of cross fertilization of ideas between two different sets of experiences, cultural practices, and design/planning traditions.  To what extent has the cumulative experiences of joint design studios over the last twenty years confirmed this assumption?  Drawing on your experience in teaching such joint studios, you could organize your presentation around any of the following questions:

1)  What do you know about such a process of knowledge production?  Are problem definition, analysis, and problem solving done differently in jointly run design studios as compared to standard studios in which only one set of students participates?

2)  Do the different groups of students actually question each other's conceptual premises?  How frequently do they alter their previously held views?  Please give examples of such "cultural interrogations"; and explore why some "interrogations" facilitate learning while other may not make any difference.

3)  How do design ideas emerge in joint design studios?  What facilitates the evolution of new ideas? What hinders?  Why certain forms of interactions facilitate while others hinder cross-cultural communications?  In other words, what type of questioning of each other helps; and conversely what hurts the confidence and learning abilities of students?

It is our hope that you will draw on their experience of managing joint studios to provide some insights – particularly the surprising ones – about co-production of knowledge, and, hopefully, we will generate some recommendations about how to further improve this innovative system of cross-cultural learning.

Participating Universities:

Roundtable Agenda:

Preparation for participating in Open House

We appreciate participating professors to prepare the following materials:

• Two minutes introduction of each program .
• Posters (optional)
• Program brochure or other education related materials (optional)

Roundtable Logistics:
The CPN Open House and Cross-Cultural Education Roundtable will be held as part of the CPN China Week 2008, the 5th year continuation of CPN’s effort to fuse western knowledge on urban development with China’s unprecedented experience. CPN China Week 2008 will be held in Beijing on July 14-19, including six main activities:

• CPN Urban Housing Conference 2008...July 14-15 (detail)
• CPN World Planning School Open House...July 15 (detail)
• CPN Cross-Cultural Education Roundtable...July 15 (detail)
• CPN City Resilience Roundtable: Rebuilding and Restoration After Sichuan Earthquake..July 16 (detail)
• CPN Sichuan Field Trip and Chengdu Forum...July 17-18 (detail)
• CPN Urban Transport Congress 2008...July 19 (detail)

Website and registration
The official CPN website: http://ChinaPlanningNetwork.org
About CPN: http://chinaplanningnetwork.org/english/about.htm
CPN 2004: http://mit.edu/dusp/chinaplanning/cpn2004/
CPN 2005: http://mit.edu/dusp/chinaplanning/cpn2005/program.htm
CPN 2006: http://chinaplanningnetwork.org/english/CPN3rdAnnual.htm
CPN 2007: http://www.chinaurbantransport.com/english/fur_ppt.htm
CPN China Week registration: http://chinaplanningnetwork.org/english/Registration.htm 

Venue and hotel
The CPN China Week will be held in Tsinghua University, Haidian District, Beijing, China. The guest hotel is Wenjin Hotel, which is 10 minutes walk away from Tsinghua campus.
Wenjin Hotel
Tsinghua Science Park, Haidian District, Beijing, China
Tel: +86-10-62525566
http://www.hotelwenjin.com

Welcome to attend the CPN China Week and thank you very much for your continued support to China Planning Network!

Best,
Ming Guo, Zhan Guo, Jinhua Zhao
Executive Commissioners
China Planning Network
http://www.ChinaPlanningNetwork.org/

Faculty Advisor
Lawrence J. Vale, Head and Professor of Urban Design and Planning
Department of Urban Studies and Planning
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

About CPN
China Planning Network (CPN) was established in 2004 and has since advanced from simply an academic interest group to become an independent voice that affects the education, research, practice and policies in China’s urban development. CPN has moved forward on its mission to systematically introduce western knowledge and experiences to China and more importantly CPN has started pursuing its vision of cultivating China's own discourse on urban development. As MIT President Susan Hockfield wrote in 2006: "Through the efforts of the China Planning Network, MIT and the Department of Urban Studies and Planning, continue to lead the world to bring the advanced knowledge on urban planning and development to bear on China's urbanization challenges."  

For information about CPN, please visit: www.ChinaPlanningNetwork.org

Contact Methods:
Organizing Committee MIT Office:
Jinhua Zhao: jinhua@mit.edu Tel: (857) 350-0079
Zhan Guo: guozhan@mit.edu Tel: (617) 230-4090
Room 7-337, the Department of Urban Studies and Planning
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Cambridge, MA 02139 U.S.A.

Organizing Committee Beijing Office:
Ming Guo: guoming@mit.edu Tel: +86-(0)10-82150296 Fax: +86-(0)10-82150269
Block A, Room 607, Building 8, Science Park Tower
Tsinghua Science Park, Beijing, China