Japan's "COE Program For The 21～(st) Century"

Developing higher education has been a strategy for every nation worldwide since the beginning of the 21st century. Many countries have successively announced to set up world-class universities, bucking for the improvement of scientific research and cultivation of talents, with the final aim of raising the over-all national power and the competitiveness of industries in the world. To achieve this goal, Japan started development of world-class universities at the beginning of 1990s, implementing "Keystone Projects of Postgraduate Schools" and "TOP30 Programs". All these moves aim at raising the scientific research levels in higher institutions and cultivating outstanding personnel. "COE Program for the 21st Century" is another important strategy taken to further develop world-class universities based on previous work, and a promoter for Japan's university reforms. In brief, it is an assistant funding program for COE advocated by Japan's Ministry of Culture and Science to develop world-class universities.In this research, the author conducted an overall study of "COE Program for the 21~st Century", applying methods as documentation, statistics, comparison and induction. The study consists of five parts. First, this study expatiates the backgrounds of the program, explains the meaning of this program, and analyses its main points in details. The second part introduces the implementation of "COE Program for the 21~st Century". The third part sums up the basic features of "COE Program for the 21~st Century" as follows, a) fundamentalness and forwardness of key programs; b) diversity and pertinency of funding subjects; c) planning and directing of course development; d) fairness and scientificness of evaluation system. The fourth part analyses the historical significance of "COE Program for the 21~st Century". The fifth part presents suggestions for developing world-class universities and higher education reforms, based on previous studies and the status quo of developing world-class universities and the present situations of higher education in China. The author brings forth some suggestions in the end."COE Program for the 21st Century" has significant meaning to the world-class universities development and the higher education reform in Japan, and provides references to China's development of world-class universities and higher education reforms.