Dr. Shi Gendong

Honorary President

Executive Director of UNESCO China ESD National Working Committee, and Director of the Innovation Studio on Ecological Civilization and Education for Sustainable Development, Beijing Academy of Education

Dr. Shi is widely regarded as “the Father of ESD in China”.

Dr. Shi have the Doctorate degree in Educational Science of Moscow National Normal University. He is the Executive Director of UNESCO China ESD National Working Committee, and Director of the Innovation Studio on Ecological Civilization and Education for Sustainable Development, Beijing Academy of Education. He was once the Deputy Director of Educational Management Department of National Institute of Education Sciences; the Head of Basic Education Institute of Beijing Academy of Educational Sciences and the Dean of Education Development Research Center. He was honored as the State Council Expert for Special Allowance in 2001. Because of his outstanding contributions over the years, Dr. Shi has been praised by the media and his colleagues as “the standard-bearer of ESD in China” and “the father of ESD in China”. In 2019, he was named “The leader of ESD in China in the past 20 years”.

He has always focused on literature research and independent theoretical speculation and creativity. “ESD roadmap in China” has been compiled to guide and lead the practice of formal and non-formal education.  Some Monographs are published in Chinese and English, such as “Introduction to Subject Education”, “ESD Report in China”, “Introduction to Sustainable Development Education”, “ESD:Education for Tomorrow”, Nearly 100 papers are published on domestic and international journals, such as “Education Research”,the total number of the words is more than 5 million. More than 30 domestic and foreign media have made special reports on the research results and experience of the project. He has been invited to UNESCO regional conference to exchange academic knowledge on sustainable development education with nearly 20 countries. Since 1999, he has presided over the editing and publication of the Journal “Education for Sustainable development in China” (Bimonthly), which has reached 95 issues with a total number of 7 million words and published a lot of UNESCO documents and excellent ESD cases. 

Dr. Ellen Touchstone

President

Inaugural Associate Dean for Responsible and Sustainable Business Education of IBSS at XJTLU

She represents IBSS as the main applicant for RCE Suzhou and coordinate among Board Members.

Dr. Ellen E Touchstone is a Senior Associate Professor of Practice at the Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University International Business School Suzhou (IBSS). She received MBA in International Business from Thunderbird Global Management School and doctor degree in Applied Linguistics from the University of Southern California. She is Associate Dean of Social Responsibility and Sustainable Business Education at the International Business School currently, has led the Carbon Neutral Project at international Business School Suzhou and integrated Ethics, Responsibility and Sustainability (ERS) throughout the curriculum. The Initiative about “15 Ways in 15 Weeks” (to reduce environmental footrpints), which she leads, recently won the Best CSR and Sustainability Initiative 2022 award from the international AMBA/BGA certificated committee. In the past year, she delivered a keynote speech In the Regard to the Importance of Collaboration for Innovation at the Education Forum for Asian Responsible Management Education branch forum, and was invited to the forum of Huawei company in Shenzhen, which topic is Technology for Sustainable Development. She has taught at the University of Southern California, the University of California, Los Angeles, California State University, Long Beach, California State University, Los Angeles, and Whittil College. She also has be in charge of marketing positions at Peoplesoft, LingualCare, Target, Dillard’s, and the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Mr. Zhu Lirong

Director

Director of Suzhou Popularizing Scientific Knowledge Promotion Center

Mr. Zhu Lirong participated in the planning of the casting of the Antarctica Peace Bell and the completion of the Great Wall Station in Antarctica. He personally participated in the scientific research activities of the Snow Dragon to journey to Antarctica in 2013.

Mr. Zhu Lirong is a native of Wujiang, Suzhou, senior planner, legal representative of Suzhou AIA Exhibition Service Co., Ltd., and director of Suzhou Science Popularization Promotion Center. Member of the 11th, 12th and 13th CPPCC Suzhou Municipal Committee, Deputy to the People’s Congress of Gusu District of Suzhou City, Director of the Suzhou Economic and Science Commission of the Peasants’ and Workers’ Party, Standing Director of the China Soft Science Research Association, Director of the China Productivity Society, Planning Expert Member of the China Productivity Society, Director of the External Relations Department of the Nanjing Purple Mountain Observatory Asteroid Foundation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Deputy Secretary-General of the Ancient Buildings Conservation Alliance of the Asia-Pacific World Heritage Training Center, Head of Cultural Construction of the Great Wall Station of the 30th Antarctic Scientific Expedition of China, “Xie Xiaosi Star”, “Mother Water Cellar Star”, ” Suzhou Garden Star”, “Hehe Star”, “Fan Jingshan Star” asteroid naming event planning organizer. Engaged in science popularization work for more than 10 years, he was awarded the “Chief Science Popularization Expert” by Suzhou City, and concurrently served as the secretary general of the second and third Suzhou Science Popularization Promotion Association, participated in the business operation of the 4th Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Technology Exhibition Fair, and the main planning business operation case was rated as the “Silver Award for Excellent Planning Cases of Chinese Enterprises” and won the title of “The Second China Excellent Planner”; He participated in the hosting of the 28th World Heritage Conference and the 28th General Assembly of the International Federation for Science and Technology, planned and organized the implementation of the “Suzhou Science Popularization Window” website, won the nomination award of the World Information Summit China, served as the chief planner of the business operation of the 47th World Congress of the International Federation of Landscape Architecture (IFLA), and won the title of “Top Ten Creative Planners in Jiangnan”.

Mr. Zhou Jiong

Director

General Manager for SIP JET Energy Technology Company

The company is an energy management company specialized in providing services of carbon reduction and carbon management for big and medium- sized organizations.

Mr. Zhou is the General Manager for JET Enenrgy Technology  company and AEE member. He has professional qualification certificates such as CEM, CEA, GBE, CDSMP, PE. He also served for State of Iowa Energy Bureau as an Engineer/Project Manager, for The University of Lowa as an Energy Manager from 1998 to 2011.  He worked for Johnson Controls (Shanghai) as an Engineer/Business Manager. His engineering fields include energy management, energy big data, automatic faults detection and diagnosis. He holds MS in Mechanical Engineering and MBA both from the University of Iowa.

He participated in the formulation of Shanghai local standard DB31/T1141-2019 “Technical Specifications for Comprehensive Monitoring and Management of Industrial Energy Efficiency” and the formulation of Shanghai local standard DB31/T1143-2019 “Technical Specifications for Online Benchmarking of Air Compressor System Energy Efficiency”.

He was invited to attend 2019 AEE World Energy Conference, “Development of Internet based energy management system for a campus wise higher education park in China” and the conference and participate in the establishment of the Smart Park Ecosphere as a Huawei Eco Partner. He was invited to deliver keynote speeches at the International Smart Energy and Utilities Summit (China Utility Week 2019) and the Yangtze River Delta Regional Energy Internet Development and Innovation Forum.

Ms. Peng Lijuan

Director

Director of Academic Affairs Office of Xingcheng Primary School, SIP

This school is a 9-grade public school characterized as STEM and SDG (Water) education.

Ms. Peng, qualified as a senior teacher in elementary school, is the Director of Academic Affairs Office of Xingcheng School, Suzhou Industrial Park. She has been teaching in primary schools for 27 years, accumulating abundant experience in the fields of language teaching, training and incubation professional head teachers and project-based research and learning. Ms Peng has presided or participated in provincial and municipal research for years, during which she has published more than 30 educational and teaching papers, and showed expertise in the topics of sustainable development, family education guidance, project-based learning, and interdisciplinary learning.

She is now working with her team on the subject that the project-based learning practice of primary school language supported by 5G technology. Owing to her outstanding contributions to elementary school education and teaching, she was honored as the Academic Leader and the Famous Class First Teacher in SIP and also got Zhou’s Moral Education Award Fund.

Ms. Tian Yuan

Director

Co-founder and President of Operations of Suzhou Vinno Technology Co., Ltd

Vinno focuses on the field of health, especially women’s health. Every year, it organizes employees and professional medical staff to carry out free clinics in mountainous villages in West China.

Ms. Tian is the Co-founder of Suzhou Vinno Technology Co., Ltd.

She received her Master of Computer Science from Helsinki University of Technology in Finland in 2003. After returning to China, she worked at GE Ultrasound R&D Center for many years, successively serving as a senior software R&D engineer, project manager, and after-sales technical manager in Asia Pacific, participating in the development of a number of global hot-selling products.

In 2010, she co-founded Fienuo Technology (Suzhou) Co., Ltd. with the team, and successively served as R&D director and operation director.

She has successively won the title of Suzhou Industrial Park Leading Talent and Gusu Leading Talent.

Mr. Luan Yu

Director

Founding Director and General Manager of Suzhou Yima Group

Yima is specialized in interior sustainable design for schools, educational organizations and educational infrastructure.

Mr. Luan has a Doctorate Degree in business administration from the Business School, Victoria University. He founded Yima Group in 2002. Yima Group has become a well-known education planning and service provider in China, which has established the educational furniture brand “Pony Bobby”, the educational environment design brand “Yima Design”, the youth out-of-school quality education complex brand “Bobby’s City”, and the youth emotional intelligence education. The brand “Bobby’s Family” has become a well-known brand in the industry and an industry benchmark.

Mr. Luan is passionate about public welfare and education, and has signed a five-year agreement with the Education Bureau of Tianzhu Tibetan Autonomous County in Gansu Province to train art teachers for free, and has twinned with Xiangrui Primary School to help and support the school, donating a library and adopting dozens of poor students; and he has signed a support agreement with Wansen Primary School in Songtao County, Tongren City, Guizhou Province to donate computers, uniforms and other materials to the elementary school every year. Luan Yu is currently the Director of Jiangsu Preschool Education Society, Vice President of Suzhou Entrepreneurs Federation of the Democratic League, and a member of Suzhou Basic Education Committee of the Democratic League. In 2010, he was awarded as “China’s Outstanding Construction Entrepreneur”, and was awarded as “Advanced Individual” by the China Democratic League in 2021.

Dr. Gao Shan

Director

Associate Professor of Philosophy Department at Soochow University

She is the founder of International Forum for Nature, Wilderness and Civilization (NWC).

Dr. Shan Gao obtained her Doctorate degree from the department of philosophy at the University of North Texas. Her research areas are comparative philosophy between China and the West and Enviropmental Philosophy. She is now working at the philosophy department of Soochow Uhiversity as an associate professor. She is the Guest editor for the Special Issue titled Nature, Wilderness and Civilization: The Chinese Scholars Perspective. This special issue was published in 2020 in the Journal of Environmental Ethics. She is also the guest editor for the Journal of Religion, which will be published in 2023. She has published about 30 articles in top ranking journal such as Environmental Ethics, Morality and Civilization, The Journal of Chinese Gardens and Ecology.In her spare time, she created the online center for Nature, Wilderness and Civilization. 

Ms. Wang Jun

Director

Founding Director of SIP Learn-Will Cultural Exchange Center; and Director of Federation of Social Organization in SIP

She has been focusing on community education for more than ten years, focusing on public welfare projects for children in difficulty and in mountainous areas. Within five years of public welfare entrepreneurship, she builds a bridge for foreign residents in Suzhou to integrate into the local community, and forming an international volunteer team in the park.

Ms. Wang is the founder and director of Learn-Will Cultural Exchange Center and director member of Federation of Social Organization in SIP. With a master’s degree in Business Administration from East China Normal University, she has been working on community education for more than 10 years, focusing on charity projects for underprivileged children and children in mountain areas. During her five years of social entrepreneurship, she has been continuously committed to the development of voluntary service projects for the culture integration based on community construction. Among them, the projects of “Integration of Expatriates in Suzhou” and “The Building of International Community” have been reported on national media.

During the epidemic, she organized a team of international volunteers to build bridges between expatriates and local communities, and to promote the multi-governance in communities. Caring about the children in Daliang Mountain, she provides supporting education in mountain area every year and influences more people and enterprises to join the action of poverty alleviation. She conveys the concept of love and explores the new path of social organizations in social governance. She has been awarded the honorary title of “The Role Model of Jiangsu”.

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