Sino-Nordic doctoral training: Ageing and Services in Changing Societies

The Sino-Nordic doctoral intensive course Ageing and Services in Changing Societies will take place at the Nordic Centre at Fudan University (NC Fudan), Shanghai on 11 - 15 October 2021. The intensive course in Shanghai will be followed by training and research collaboration between the 25 - 30 participants and some 15 teachers.

The principal fields of the project are ageing and later life, communication and media, nursing science, (social) gerontology, social work, sociology and special education. The main themes of the intensive course are

• digitalisation in the lives of older adults
• services for older adults
• social relations of older adults
• ageing in China and strategic responses.

The project is in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goal 3: Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages.

All universities participating in the project belong to the Nordic Centre at Fudan University (NC Fudan) a network of Fudan University, Shanghai and 25 Nordic universities as well as the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies (NIAS), Chinese Duke Kunshan University and Xi'an Jiaotong Liverpool University as affiliated members. The Centre is located on the main campus of Fudan University.

One of the three main pillars in the NC Fudan strategy for 2020 - 2023 is offering priority to new collaborative educational partnerships with a focus on innovation and group-work between Chinese and Nordic students. In addition to following this strategy, the project will respond to a need for doctoral courses organised at NC Fudan and available for all member universities. The goal is that, after this pilot training at doctoral level, NC Fudan will organise similar trainings with changing themes regularly in the future.

We aim to find new initiatives and evidence for how to support a good life for older adults and for their families in general through international collaboration and interdisciplinary research.

The intensive doctoral course in Shanghai and the visits of Chinese PhD students to Finland and Sweden planned for 2022 will make it possible for the participants of the course to better understand the situation on the spot in all three countries involved in the project. This will equip them with new approaches to study and solve ageing-related challenges in their own countries.

The students and the teachers will take advantage of best practices in use and new ideas emerging in both geographical areas in order to develop better-customised services for older adults.

We follow the strategy of the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture by increasing competitiveness and productivity with the help of digital solutions as well as by educating experts to interact in international contexts.

The doctoral students will receive different and comparative perspectives to one’s own research concept as well as support for their individual research. This will have long-lasting positive effects, promoting further cooperation.

The teachers/researchers will develop their teaching methods in a different cultural setting. This will create opportunities to build new international multidisciplinary cooperation, research projects and innovations.

The participating universities will have opportunities to widen their scientific networks in both multidisciplinary and international regard.

Older adults and their close ones in both Chinese and Nordic societies may have new research-based and cost-effective solutions to be implemented in practice to ease the current challenging situation in the social and health care systems.

The Asia Programme of the Finnish National Agency for Education (EDUFI) and the Nordic Centre at Fudan University network

Tampere University