"This is an era where the speed of change is faster than almost everyone expected. All kinds of black swan incidents occur frequently, and a seemingly inconspicuous COVID-19 virus can unexpectedly shut down the whole human society. There has never been such a great conflict between internationalization and anti-internationalization, and profound and rapid changes are taking place in the international environment and international order."

This is a passage written by Professor Yu Xinjie, Secretary of the CPC Committee of EEA, Tsinghua University, to the freshmen of the Tsinghua Plan for Strengthening Basic Disciplines.

To face such a "great change that has not happened in a century", higher education should actively consider the situation, adhere to the right and make innovations. In recent years, under the guidance of the Global Strategy and the internationalization Capability Enhancement Program of Tsinghua University (2020 Program for short), EEA has actively constructed a new model and mechanism for international development in the light of the characteristics of electrical engineering disciplines, effectively gathered and made full use of international elements and resources, carried out active exploration and practice in the reform of international talent training mode, international exchange between teachers and students, international scientific research cooperation and so on, and gradually created an international development strategy of "Talent Incubation, Faculty Cultivation and Platform Construction".

Talent Incubation: to improve the quality of internationalized talent incubation

"As an engineering department, how can we internationalize the talent incubation? We have made a lot of attempts in the past few years." Professor Kang Chongqing, Dean of EEA, said at the THU International Cooperation and Exchange also Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan Work Conference held on September 3, 2020.

In January 2018, Tsinghua University put forward the "2020 Plan", aiming at that the internationalized university running capacity should be improved to the level of world-class universities by 2020. In response to the call of the university, EEA has set up a master's program in the field of energy Internet, and established an international class on energy Internet, offering English courses and bilingual courses to recruit students from all over the world. By 2019, the international class has enrolled a total of 50 students, including 13 foreign students.

In the specific process of teaching and training, EEA makes full use of the resources of cooperative universities and well-known international academic organizations such as IEEE and IET to organize a series of student competitions and academic exchange activities.

In 2017, IIF (International Institute of Forecasters) brought the course "Power System Forecasting Technology" taught by Professor Kang Chongqing of EEA into IIF's Student Award Program in Forecasting. The students who perform best in the course each year are recommended to IIF and awarded the IIF Student Forecasting Award.

EEA of Tsinghua University has always attached importance to the cultivation of students' scientific and technological innovating and practicing ability, and actively encourages and supports them to participate in various scientific innovation, scientific research projects and competitions both inside and outside the university at home and abroad. In order to further stimulate students' innovation enthusiasm and cultivate students' innovation ability, EEA and Sichuan Energy Internet Research Institute of Tsinghua University have set up the "Future Energy Interest Team of Tsinghua University" matched with special funds and high-quality resources to focus on supporting students to carry out extracurricular scientific and technological innovation activities. The final of 2018 IFEC (International Future Energy Challenge) of IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) was successfully held at Tsinghua University from July 19 to 20. IFEC is the world topmost students' competition in the field of power electronics sponsored by IEEE. Ten student teams from six countries and regions, including Chinese mainland, Taiwan, the United States, Germany and Singapore stepped into the finals. The team of Tsinghua University participating in the IFEC competition, composed of EEA undergraduates Chen Huan, Yi Zheyuan, Chai Ruiying, Tang Yiwei, Li Haoran and graduate student Liu Ran, and directing teacher Wang Kui, won the "Outstanding performance Award".

During the summer vacation of 2019, 12 students from EEA went to Italy and attended the first "China-Italy Advanced Manufacturing Summer School" jointly organized by Tsinghua University, the University of Naples and the University of Bergamo in Italy. After 14 days' study, they surveyed the frontiers of advanced science and technology, broadened their disciplinary horizons, built friendship bridges and enhanced cultural integration.

In 2020, to protect from the COVID-19, the summer school was run in the form of online reports and exchanges. In order to ensure the quality of teaching, teachers of EEA held more than 15 online meetings with teachers in Italy, and identified the curriculum syllabus including future communication network, advanced power electronics technology, optical fiber sensing and image processing, robot and automation, mechatronics system integration, enhanced manufacturing and network information security, as well as a detailed plan for online meeting platform teaching, discussion and assessment. The persistence, enthusiasm and cooperative spirit of the teachers deeply affected the students. In the end, a total of 66 students from 19 different universities around the world participated in the summer school. At the graduation ceremony of the summer school, Wang Jian, Deputy Chairperson and Secretary General of CSAA (China Science & Technology Automation Alliance), said with feeling: "This is far beyond my expectation and has benefited me greatly."

Faculty cultivation: to improve the faculty to the world level

Taking "Importing and then exporting" as the core strategy to recruit and cultivate talents is the concept of the faculty construction of EEA.

Based on the cooperation with foreign high-level academic institutions, EEA actively organizes and recommends young backbone teachers to study abroad and participate in international academic activities. In 2019, two young teachers of EEA were sent abroad for an one-year study, and four teachers became the new IET fellows. Now, EEA has a total of 10 IEEE fellows and 20 IET Fellow, many of the faculty serve as chief editors, deputy editors or editors of important academic journals, and many serve in the working groups of important international organizations.

In 2019, Professor Liang Xidong of EEA was granted the IEC 1906 Award, which is one of the most important awards of IEC and established by the IEC Executive Committee to commemorate the establishment of IEC in 1906.

Attracting overseas top-grade talents is also an important way to improve the internationalization level of our faculty. In the past three years, EEA has continuously imported five young and middle-aged talents from overseas, which has played a significant role in promoting the internationalization of discipline development, scientific research and talent incubation. Following the successful appointment of Professor Li Zeyuan, former director of VT CPES as a chair professor at Tsinghua University, EEA has set up a faculty with academician Li Zeyuan as the chief and more than 10 European and American academicians, IEEE fellows and authoritative experts in the international power electronics field as chair lecturers. In July 2019, Li Zeyuan's faculty opened a summer course on "Modeling and Control of Power Electronic Converters" in Tsinghua University. This is an elective course restricted to 60 students, but nearly 200 students listened to it at present, receiving a strong response and outstanding teaching result.

Four international experts invited by EEA were awarded honorary titles of Tsinghua University, including the honorary professor Dushan Boroyevich, who is an academician of Virginia Tech, and 3 outstanding visiting professors, namely, Professor Tim Green from Imperial College of Technology, Academician Nikolaos CHatziargyriou from National University of Science and Technology of Athens, and Academician Claudio Ca帽izares from University of Waterloo in Canada.

In 2019, EEA "Jingde Tribune" opened, Professor Deepak Divan, an academician of NAE and famous expert in the field of power electronics, and Professor Vijay Vittal, an academician of NAE and famous expert of power system, were invited to give special academic reports for EEA, more than 200 people listened to each lecture, and students can listen to the cutting-edge academic courses of world first-class universities and first-class teachers without going abroad.

Through the import of high-end overseas wisdom, EEA has not only expanded the faculty, but also formed and maintained a high frequency of international academic reports. In 2019, more than 70 international scholars visited EEA of Tsinghua University, all from well-known universities and research institutions in the field of electrical engineering in Europe and the United States. They have brought nearly 50 international academic reports for students in EEA, creating a good atmosphere of international interaction, and providing sufficient conditions for teachers and students to expand their international horizons.

Platform construction: to build an internationally renowned first-class electrical discipline

In addition to talent incubation and the construction of a scientific research team, the improvement of the internationalization level also depends on the creation of an internationalization platform to further intensify international exchanges and cooperation and upgrade the comprehensive discipline. By finding and organizing superior resources around the world and implementing the cooperation and expansion plan of international well-known universities and enterprises, EEA has embarked on a road of cooperation and innovation with strong-strong combination and complementary advantages.

In March 2019, "Tsinghua University - Imperial College London Joint Research Centre for Smart Power and Energy Systems" was formally established. Tsinghua University and Imperial College London are highly complementary in smart power and energy system research. The establishment of the Joint Research Centre can help the two parties learn from each other and promote international research in related fields. It fully demonstrates the level and status of EEA in international cooperation in the field of electrical engineering in China.

In addition to cooperating in the establishment of research institutions, EEA also actively provides funds to support teachers to host and participate in the organization of large-scale important international and domestic academic conferences, so as to build bridges for cooperation between academia and industry at home and abroad. In 2019, EEA, as a major unit, organized or hosted more than 10 international/ bilateral meetings, including: 2019 IEEE International Conference on Sustainable Power and Energy, 2019 IEEE Power Grid Forum, 2019 IEEE Energy Internet and Energy system Integration Conference, and 2019 Robot Core Components and Key Technologies Summit Forum (6th) also China-EU Intelligent Robot Conference, etc.

The 16th IET International Conference on AC/DC Transmission (ACDC 2020) held in July, 2020 was the first online international academic conference approved by the Ministry of Education since the epidemic. This conference, jointly organized by IET (Institution of Engineering and Technology) and Tsinghua University, conducted online and live broadcast on Tencent Meeting, Weibo and Bilibili, has attracted more than 5,000 experts, scholars, teachers and students and practitioners from all over the world, explored a new mode of international academic exchange during the epidemic, and brought forward new ideas for international academic conferences.

EEA of Tsinghua University and the National CPES of VT have actively established a deep cooperative relationship. In September, 2020, the two units held the first joint academic annual conference of CPES and PEC. Professor Dushan Boroyevich, director of CPES of VT and an academician of NAE, presided over the conference, and Kang Chongqing, Dean of EEA, made a report on the conference. At the same time, the two sides specially set September 3 as "VT - Tsinghua Cooperation Day".

Take more measures to carry forward the past and forge ahead into the future

Since the international discipline evaluation was initialized in 2010, the teachers and students of EEA have realized more and more clearly that international cooperation and exchange is a window for them to expand their international vision, improve their reputation and let the world know about EEA, and thus gradually regarded this work as one of the most important links in the construction of a world-class electrical engineering discipline.

Looking back, we can see that through the development strategy of "Talent incubation, faculty cultivation and discipline construction", the internationalization level of the EEA has been effectively improved. Looking forward, in this era with "great changes in a century", to enhance international cooperation and exchanges and to continuously improve the internationalized educating level are still the unremitting pursuit of EEA. As Professor Kang Chongqing said at the foreign affairs work meeting of THU, "through the gradual implementation of the internationalization strategy, EEA will continue to expand internationalization channels, promote internationalization progress, realize high quality cultivation of internationalized talents, and bring the electrical engineering discipline of THU into the ranks of world-class disciplines."