Every reporter: Zhang Huaishui Every editor: Chen Xu
The total budget represents the overall investment of the university in the coming period, and sufficient funding is an important support for the university to achieve high-quality and high-level development.
Recently, universities in Beijing, Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and other provinces (municipalities and autonomous regions) across the country have announced their 2024 budget funds. Among them, Tsinghua University topped the list with a scale of 38.57 billion yuan, and Zhejiang University and Shanghai Jiao Tong University ranked "List" and "Tanhua" with 32.881 billion yuan and 28.158 billion yuan respectively.
After comparing the budget data of colleges and universities in 2022 and 2023, the reporter of "Daily Economic News" found that among the top ten universities, the budget of Harbin Institute of Technology has increased significantly, jumping from seventh to fifth last year, and Southeast University has surpassed Wuhan University to squeeze into the top ten.
At the same time, among the 147 "double first-class" universities in the country, the disparity in budget funding is still very obvious. For example, Yanbian University's budget this year is only about 1/36 of that of Tsinghua University. As a "dark horse" among non-"double first-class" universities, Shenzhen University's budget in 2024 is as high as 7.246 billion yuan, ranking first among local universities.
The drone is about to land in the drone airdrop cabinet located at the Shenzhen International Graduate School of Tsinghua University Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Mao Siqian
The budget of the top 10 universities increased by 8.3 billion yuan compared with last year
Funding is the basic guarantee for the high-quality development of education. The continuous increase in investment in education fully reflects the great importance that the party and the state attach to the cause of education.
The reporter of "Daily Economic News" combed and found that as of now, from the budget announced by various universities this year, there are 24 colleges and universities with a budget scale of more than 10 billion yuan, and all of them are "double first-class" universities. Among them, compared with 2023, the top 10 universities with the largest budget this year have increased their funding from 219.5 billion yuan to 227.8 billion yuan, an increase of about 8.3 billion yuan.
According to the data released by the universities, a total of four universities have annual budgets of more than 20 billion yuan this year, namely Tsinghua University, Zhejiang University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Peking University, which has not changed from last year. It is worth noting that the budget of Harbin Institute of Technology has increased significantly in recent years, from about 14.418 billion yuan in 2022 to 19.463 billion yuan in 2024, an increase of about 35%.
The reporter combed and found that among the seven universities directly under the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology ranked first in 2024, followed by Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, about 14.884 billion yuan, and Beijing Institute of Technology and Northwestern Polytechnical University with a budget of more than 10 billion yuan, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing University of Science and Technology and Harbin Engineering University have budgets of more than 5 billion yuan.
Chu Zhaohui, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Education Sciences, said in a telephone interview with a reporter from the "Daily Economic News" that budget funds are material conditions for a university and play an important fundamental role. Generally speaking, public universities are mainly funded by financial allocations and regular research revenues.
"The amount of funding is the foundation, but whether a university can run well depends more on the internal governance of the university. Chu Zhaohui further said that the high budget is one thing, but how to make good use of the funds to improve the school's scientific research and teaching level is a test of school management.
Nankai University held the 2024 "Double First-Class" University Campus Recruitment Activity Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Zhao Zishuo
There is a huge disparity in budgets between "double first-class" universities
As early as 2022, the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Finance, and the National Development and Reform Commission jointly issued the "Several Opinions on Deepening the Construction of World-class Universities and First-class Disciplines" (hereinafter referred to as the "Opinions").
The "Opinions" pointed out that the construction of world-class universities and first-class disciplines (hereinafter referred to as the "double first-class" construction) is a major strategic deployment made by the CPC Central Committee and the State Council. Since the implementation of the "double first-class" construction, various tasks have been vigorously promoted, and the reform and development have achieved remarkable results, promoting the construction of a strong country in higher education to a new historical starting point.
The reporter of "Daily Economic News" combed and found that among the top 50 universities in 2024, only Shenzhen University is a non-"double first-class" university. However, Shenzhen University's budget for this year has reached 7.246 billion yuan, surpassing many subordinate institutions such as Southwest Jiaotong University, Nankai University, and Beijing Jiaotong University.
The reporter noted that in the development of higher education, Shenzhen can be called the most "wealthy" city in China. According to the data released by the local government, in 2023, Shenzhen's expenditure on education will exceed 100 billion yuan for the first time, of which nearly 20 billion yuan will be spent on higher education, and the scale of the city's financial investment in higher education is close to that of Beijing and Shanghai.
At the same time, the reporter found that in the list of "double first-class" universities, the difference in school budget between different regions is also very significant. For example, Yanbian University, a "double first-class" university in Jilin Province, has a budget of 1.067 billion yuan in 2024, which is very different from Tsinghua University and other leading universities.
Chu Zhaohui said in an interview with the "Daily Economic News" reporter that in recent years, the mainland's higher education investment has shown a trend of increasing growth. However, the differences in budget allocations between different universities need to be analyzed on a case-by-case basis.
"First of all, the financial allocation accounts for the majority of the budget funds of public universities, which is divided into central funds and provincial funds. Chu Zhaohui said that in accordance with the national policy, it is necessary to build first-class universities and first-class disciplines as the central task. The more obvious this orientation is, the more we want to invest in first-class schools, so as to avoid the inefficient operation of financial funds. As a result, some universities may receive more research projects and more government funding. The funding of provincial colleges and universities, affected by local financial pressures, may be relatively low.
Previously, according to the "Statistical Announcement on the Implementation of National Education Funding in 2022" issued by the Ministry of Education, the National Bureau of Statistics, and the Ministry of Finance, in 2022, the total investment in national education funding will be 6,132.914 billion yuan, exceeding 6 trillion yuan for the first time, an increase of 5.97% over the previous year. The state financial expenditure on education was 4,847.291 billion yuan, an increase of 5.75 percent over the previous year, accounting for 4.01 percent of GDP, which is also the 11th consecutive year that the proportion of national financial education expenditure in GDP has exceeded 4 percent.
Only 1 university in the "four provinces of mountains and rivers" squeezed into the "10 billion club"
Since the second half of last year, Shandong, Shanxi, Henan, and Hebei provinces have been out of the circle because of the statement of "Shanhe University", but some netizens are unhappy that "Henan, Hebei, and Shanxi provinces, with a total population of more than 200 million, do not have a 985 university". The budget of colleges and universities also reflects the dilemma faced by the "four provinces" from another perspective.
The reporter of "Daily Economic News" combed the top ten universities in Shandong, Shanxi, Henan and Hebei and found that only Shandong University was squeezed into the "10 billion club", with a budget of 13.971 billion yuan this year. In addition, Ocean University of China and China University of Petroleum (East China) are two universities with a budget of more than 5 billion yuan, and all three universities are from Shandong Province.
However, the remaining top 10 universities in Shanxi, Henan and Hebei are all outside the top 50 on the list. For example, Zhengzhou University, which ranks second highest in the three provinces, has a budget of 3.762 billion yuan in 2024.
The emergence of "Shanhe University" reflects people's attention to the allocation of higher education resources and their expectations for the balanced development of higher education in the mainland.
Previously, Wu Yan, vice minister of education, said in response to media questions on this issue that the Ministry of Education has also paid attention to everyone's discussion of "Shanhe University". In the face of the new situation in which higher education has entered a new stage of popularization and the new challenges and problems of serving regional economic and social development, the Ministry of Education will continue to optimize the distribution and structure of higher education resources, support the central and western regions, especially the provinces with large populations, to expand the scale of higher education resources, and optimize the type and regional structure.
National Business Daily