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About Shanghai Art & Design Academy

Shanghai Art & Design Academy is the only independent art and design higher vocational college in Shanghai. It is also the only higher vocational college in Shanghai to undertake the pilot reform of the national education system and the only Shanghai to be selected into the national “double high” construction plan. The higher vocational colleges of Shanghai were jointly established in 2003 by Shanghai Arts and Crafts School (built in 1960) and Shanghai Second Light Industry Workers’ University (built in 1979). With arts and crafts as its foundation and advantages, the college has cultivated more than 30,000 industry talents and a large number of well-known design masters, craft masters, artists and entrepreneurs at home and abroad for more than 60 years.

The college is the only art and design college among the 100 national exemplary higher vocational colleges; the national advanced unit of vocational education; the research base for the inheritance of China’s intangible cultural heritage determined by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism; the employment of national graduates Top 50 universities with typical experience; Top 50 universities with typical experience in innovation and entrepreneurship in China; Top 50 national vocational colleges with international influence and top 50 education effectiveness; ranked in the comprehensive competitiveness ranking of national vocational colleges for five consecutive years. Shanghai First place, ranking first in the competitiveness rankings of the national art and sports higher vocational colleges for three consecutive years; it is the “first-class higher vocational” construction college in Shanghai. In 2019, the college became the only vocational college in Shanghai that was selected as the “High-level Higher Vocational School and Professional Construction Plan with Chinese Characteristics”. In 2020, the college and East China Normal University were approved as a training and cultivation base for principals of vocational colleges of the Ministry of Education. It is the first higher vocational college in Shanghai to be selected.

The college earnestly implements the spirit of Shanghai’s comprehensive education reform, with the goal of building a characteristic higher art academy, and is committed to creating a cultural heritage and creative talent education highland that is deeply rooted in Chinese culture, unique in Shanghai style, and has the characteristics of the times and a world-class vision. In recent years, the college has established the “Arts and Crafts +” strategy, and strives to promote the integration of arts and crafts with fashion life, technological innovation, and creative design. It has set up the School of Handcraft Art, Product Design School, Environmental Art School, Digital Art School, and WPP Visual Arts School. 5 secondary colleges, covering 23 majors in arts and crafts design, digital media art design, public art design, product art design, advertising design and production, etc., for art creation, product design, environmental design, digital entertainment, cultural media, etc. Provide excellent talents and services in cultural and creative fields closely related to people’s lives. The college established the Arts and Crafts Research Center to focus on the inheritance and productive protection of intangible cultural heritage.

The college seized the opportunity of the construction of Shanghai’s “four major brands” and the development of cultural and creative industries, and established the “Shanghai Digital Art Public Training Base”, “Shanghai Arts and Crafts Public Training Base”, etc., bringing together “Oriental Scholars Team”, Master studios led by international designers, arts and crafts masters, and folk special arts masters have gradually formed a school-running form with production-oriented training workshops and various studios as the main body.

The college continues to explore new ways to cooperate with top international companies in running schools, and establish various forms of school-enterprise cooperation education models. The college’s educational reform project achievement “Connecting to top international companies, innovating school-running mechanisms to train high-end art and design professionals” broke the bottleneck of vocational school-enterprise cooperation, and won the Shanghai-level Teaching Achievement Award Special Prize and the National Teaching Achievement Award Second Prize. College students have repeatedly participated in the D&AD competition, one of the four top international creative design competitions, the Hamburg International Animation Competition in Germany, the Chinese world’s largest advertising creative award, the Times Golden Calf Award, and the National College Student Advertising Competition. Winners in the competition.