Bachelor in Architectural Engineering

Founded in October 1980, the Department of Architectural Engineering is one of the earliest established departments in Heifei University. The department offers five undergraduate specialties: Civil Engineering, Architecture, Engineering Management, Transportation Engineering, and Civil Engineering (2+3). It has over 1,600 students and 46 faculty members, including four professors and 14 associate professors.

There are two research centers in the department: Institute of Civil Engineering Management and Institute of Building Physics and Energy Conservation (Sino-German joint construction), for engineering designing and consulting as well as related research projects. The Experimental Centre of the department consists of 15 laboratories: Civil Engineering Measurement, Civil Engineering Materials, Engineering Mechanics, Soil Mechanics, Architectural Structure, Road Engineering, Engineering Geology, Architectural Physic, Architectural Model, Architectural Electrics and Equipment, Digital simulation technology of structural engineering, Architecture Innovation, Transportation Engineering, Hydromechanics, and Engineering Management. The fixed asset in labs has amounted to more than 1.6 million yuan, and many advanced facilities are imported from Germany.

Under a joint construction program, the department was built with the help of the German University of Applied Sciences. Because of the agreement signed by Anhui Province and Lower Saxony in Germany inMarch,1985, the department has academic ties with a number of universities in Lower Saxony. In 2006, the department established the specialty of Civil Engineering (2+3)according to another agreement with Hildesheim University of Applied Sciences, achieving the goal of training undergraduates through Sino-German cooperation. Since then, about 60 students have been studying in Germany for a bachelor’s or a master's degree.

Hefei University (HFU), previously known as Hefei Union University, is an undergraduate university founded in 1980. It was “born in the era of reform and opening-up, and develops in the period of innovation”. During its early years, the university put forward a school-running mode that features “appropriate tuition, self-job-finding, discipline inlinewith practical needs, and logistics outsourcing”, which aroused great interest of the society and was covered by mainstream media like People’s Daily and Guangming Daily. The university was once honored as a forerunner in China’s Higher Education Reform.

In March 2002, approved by the Ministry of Education, Hefei University was set up based on the previous Hefei Union University, Hefei Institute of Education, and Hefei Normal School. Since then, the university has persisted in its guideline of “serving the local, training students into applied talent and strengthening cooperation with foreign higher-learning institutions”. It has made good use of the experience of the universities of applied sciences in Germany(Fachhochschule) and created a distinctive application-oriented cultivation system with a focus on key factors to improve the ability and skills of students. Thanks to the system reform and implementation thereof, the university has succeeded in producing a great many high-caliber professionals for local development. Since 2009, the students of HFU have won 246 prizes in national sci-tech innovation contests, among which 47 are first prizes and special prizes, and some are even the only one or the first time rewarded to a university in Anhui Province. Moreover, the students have won 118 gold medals, 72 silvers, and 68 bronzes in sports events. HFU was awarded a national second teaching achievement prize with the project “Research, Innovation, and Practice-based on Experience from Applied Talent Training System in German Undergraduate Universities” in 2009, and then the first prize in 2014, which is the top prize to a provincial university of Anhui.