Dalian Maritime University (DMU) held the International Maritime Education Conference from 22 to 23 September. The IAMU Executive Director and Coordinator were invited, and the Executive Director gave his speech at the opening ceremony in the afternoon of 23 October. Many maritime educational institutes inside and outside China participated and provided interesting speeches and presentations.
The IMO Secretary-General, Mr Kitack Lim, also joined the opening ceremony and gave his insights on maritime education. The majority of international guests were from IAMU member universities. (Please see the below list).
Prof. Adam Weintrit, the Chair of IAMU and Rector of Gdynia Maritime University, spoke about the importance of cooperation and collaboration among institutions and explained IAMU’s mission, during his speech at the opening ceremony.
On the morning of 23 October, participants visited four facilities of DMU as a campus visit. Although DMU collaborates with many institutions worldwide, DMU also seems to be keen on collaborating with different departments inside DMU. Dalian Northeast Asia International Shipping Center is the cooperation of DMU and the Dalian municipal government. The center provides opportunities for many faculties of DMU to work together on different projects. They showed several projects that are applications of Big Data in broad areas, such as reducing Ship Emissions to the One Belt One Road Initiative. Their research lab allowed postgraduate students and researchers to apply theories in the real world.
The conference on 24 October consisted of three sessions with 28 speakers. Some overarching concerns about maritime education were addressed. Speakers presented their perspectives on those concerns and how they tried to deal with them. One of the most exciting things for me was Prof. Choi, Korea Maritime and Ocean Univeristy’s “Interactive Learning”. “Creating a Web Video Drama” which was one example he introduced in his presentation. Each group was assigned a conflict situation to make a web video. The video-making procedure trained students to analyse the situation from different perspectives because there were characters, and they needed to imagine how each character reacted. Also, watching other groups’ videos widened their view of certain problems.
The conference made me consider what I can do for Maritime Education as an IAMU staff. I was very grateful for this excellent opportunity.
I would like to express my sincere appreciation to everyone who worked for the conference at Dalian Maritime University, especially Dr. Sun Yuqing, the former President who invited me, Dr. Ma Mingfei, and Ms. Wu Qiong, who supported my travel preparation.
Invited Speakers from IAMU member universities
Opening Ceremony
Maximo Mejia, President, World Maritime University
ZHAO Youtao, Vice President, Dalian Maritime University
Adam Weintrit, President, Gdynia Maritime University/ Chair, International Association of Maritime Universities
SHI Xin, Vice President, Shanghai Maritime University
Takeshi Nakazawa, Executive Director, International Association of Maritime Universities
YU Hongliang, Vice President, Jimei University
Session 1
Ronald Raymond Lacson Sebastian, CEO, John B. Lacson Foundation Maritime University, Philippines
YE Ning, Vice President, Tianjin University of Technology
Ganapathy Thiruvasagam, Pro-Chancellor, Academy of Maritime Education and Training University, India
ZHANG Guochen, Vice President, Dalian Ocean University
Angelica Baylon, Director of External Relations Office Maritime Academy of Asia and the Pacific, Philippines
Session 2
Ismail Abdel Ghafar Ismail Farag, President, Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport
Pham Xuan Duong, President, Vietnam Maritime University
George Gabedava, Deputy Rector, Batumi Navigation Teaching University, Georgia
Riitta Tempakka, Dean, Faculty of Logistics and Maritime Technology, Satakunta University of Applied Sciences, Finland
CHOI Jin-Chul, Dean, Office of International Affairs, National Korea Maritime and Ocean University
Vlado Francic, Vice Dean, Faculty of Maritime Studies, University of Rijeka
Session 3
Qi CHEN, Professor, Massachusetts Maritime Academy
Kondappan Saravanan, Registrar, Indian Maritime University
Koji Murai, Professor, Department of Maritime Systems Engineering, Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology
