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Fudan president pledges to scrap short-term assessments, back decade-long research 2026-03-08
Fudan University will eliminate short-term performance evaluations and allow scientists to pursue original research lasting a decade or more, the university's president said last Friday, outlining one of the most significant academic reform pledges to emerge from this year's National People's Congress session.
Jin Li, speaking at the open session of the Shanghai delegation to the 14th NPC, said Fudan plans to establish a "basic research special zone" where conventional assessment cycles no longer apply. The aim is to free researchers to tackle high-risk, long-horizon problems and produce what Jin called "first-kilometer" breakthroughs – foundational discoveries that seed future technologies rather than deliver near-term outputs.
"Scientific and technological innovation should not be constrained by disciplinary boundaries," Jin said, according to Shangguan News.
The announcement is part of a broader institutional overhaul. Jin said Fudan is shifting its organizational logic away from building ranked academic disciplines and toward serving national strategic priorities. The university has mapped out five strategic orientations, 15 domains and 100 focus areas. Of those 100 areas, 80 involve cross-disciplinary collaboration, a proportion Jin described as making interdisciplinary work "the mainstream."
Jin also pointed to Shanghai's wider innovation record as context for the university's ambitions. Strategic emerging industries now make up 45 percent of the city's GDP, he said. Its three designated flagship sectors – integrated circuits, biopharmaceuticals and artificial intelligence – have combined to exceed 2 trillion yuan in annual output. More than 320 new technology companies are incorporated in the city each day.
He described higher education institutions as a critical junction linking scientific output, human capital and industrial application, and said Fudan intends to be at the front of Shanghai's push to build an internationally competitive science and technology hub.
Source: City News Service
