Full-time Master of Arts (MA) in Design
International Training Program for Professional Degree Postgraduate Students
（Regional culture and social innovation）
1. Introduction
The School of Design of Hunan University was founded in 1977. In 1993, it was qualified to confer Master's Degree in industrial plastic arts (now design) in the first batch in China. In 2005, qualified to confer the doctoral degree in design art (now design). In 2006, named one of the 60 best design art schools in the world by U.S. Business Week. In 2008, Industrial Design was rated as National Characteristic Specialty. In 2009, we obtained the Master of Fine Arts (MFA) degree-granting, and have doctoral degree and postdoctoral mobile station in design, which provides strong support for the MFA degree. At present, we have National Experimental Teaching Demonstration Center, National Talent Training Demonstration Zone, and China-Italy Design and Innovation Center, which provides good teaching conditions and we are also an important part of the National Key Laboratory for Advanced Design and Manufacture of Automobile Bodies.
The School of Design currently has three special fields: high-end equipment and transportation; intelligent products and interaction design; media art and social innovation. This training direction belongs to the media art and social innovation. Since 2009, the School of Design of Hunan University has focused on the theme of regional culture and social innovation, through large-scale, cross-regional and cross-cultural social experiments and years of faculty and curriculum system construction, field practice, scientific research and international cooperate, gradually improve the cultural and social innovation talent training system with Chinese culture and international vision, and cultivate innovative talents for comprehensive development of rural revitalization.
In the field of practice, in the past ten years, we has organized “New Channel” design and social innovation projects, organized more than 400 teachers and students from 15 countries to carry out field work, visited more than 50 cultural villages, and traveled more than 100,000 kilometers. Based on the construction of local cultural resources platform, by means of developing characteristic cultural industries, we have completed a large number of digital image recording, tourism planning and landscape design, cultural and creative product design, children's art creation, apps and interactive games development, knowledge platform construction and e-commerce platform incubation, international exhibitions, etc. cooperated with local craftsmen and villagers, we gradually improved the "community research and social innovation design" teaching system and participatory design methods. participating teachers and students constantly thinking about historical value, aesthetic value and social value of “Cultural significance”, and accumulated rich experience in regional culture research and rural revitalization practice at the level of innovative tools and methods; in the field of academic research, we have achieved diversified and outstanding results including domestic and foreign awards, student works awards, entrepreneurial achievements, excellent publishing works, high-level papers, patents of cultural creation, images and music, etc. Through the relevant international cooperation curriculum design and graduation design, we have won a number of domestic and international design competition gold awards, and established a number of protect and inherit bases of intangible cultural heritage and creative spaces, to train students' marketization and internationalization ability through the combination of production, study and research, and cooperation with well-known enterprises at home and abroad.
The awards currently received include: Japan GMARK Community Research and Design Award, People's Daily CSR Chinese Cultural Award, achieve the first prize in poverty alleviation in Colleges and Universities directly under the Ministry of Education twice in succession, and the project results received a high praise and a formal letter of thanks from the Princess Anne, HRH of British, the recommendation of the royal official website, and a high degree of recognition from Kasem Watanachai , the Minister of the Privy Council of Thailand.
2. Research Field
Regional culture and social innovation
3. Training Mission
To enable students to master relevant research theories of regional culture and social innovation, and cultivate their solid interdisciplinary research and design innovation capabilities to cope with the complex problems encountered in the revitalization and social development of Asia in the current international perspective. This will promote the in-depth cultural exchanges, resource integration and collaborative innovation of Asian countries along the Belt and Road to achieve the sustainable development goals of regional culture and social revitalization.
4. Enrollment Numbers
The enrollment quota is 10 people.
5. Training Method and Educational System
(1) Adopt a full-time postgraduate management model and implement a centralized school-based learning approach.
(2) The course mainly adopts a small class and is taught in English, students can also take public courses and MOOCs certificated by the Chinese Ministry of Education as elective courses, which are bilingual teaching in both Chinese and English). Emphasising on research based on “design practice”, the supervisor responsibility system is implemented. Supervisor is responsible for guiding the graduate program, design practice and thesis; School of Design will set up a special postgraduate guidance group for this project, responsible for the training and assessment of international students in this project.
(3) Full-time MA in design degree graduate program is based on a flexible study period of 2~3years, and all courses are completed in the first year in HUN. The second or third year is in the practice of the enterprise. We highly recommend students choose to go back to Thailand to find a business for an internship.
(4) Implement the credit system. The total credits are 70 credits, including 36 credits (including 21credits for degree basic courses, 15 credits for degree direction courses), 2 credits for academic activities, 2 credits for opening report, and 30 credits for thesis and final design.
（5）Curriculum in each academic year：
1) First-year: compulsory and elective courses
General Introduction of Chinese Culture; Reginal Culture and Hunan Culture Research; Design Research Method; Design Sociology and Anthropology; Intangible Culture Heritage and Digital Transformation Methods; Social Innovation Design Methods and Practices; Product and Service Design System; Cultural Industry Theory and Practice; Brand Design and Management; Tourism Market Management; Cultural Space design; etc.
2) Second-year: Graduation practice, Graduation design, Graduation dissertation.
After completing the graduation internship and graduation project design for no less than 6 months, students should complete the graduation thesis, and submit the final thesis 4 months before graduation defense. Graduation defense can be held after being reviewed and approved by the supervisor and the School of Design postgraduate guidance group.
（6） Graduation requirements of MA：
The full-time Master of Arts (MA) degree in design graduate degree work is carried out in the form of “graduation design + thesis”.
Graduation design must be done in the form of an art design. The thesis should be the creative thinking and theoretical exposition on the final design work, in line with academic norms, and the number of words is 20-30 thousands words.
Graduation design and thesis are conducted in the form of graduation design presentations and thesis defense. The level of graduation practice is an important aspect of the full-time Master of Arts (MA) degree in design. It must be carried out in the form of a graduation exhibition before graduation. The final design work should have a strong professional level and generally be a complete design.
6.奖学金及湖南大学提供条件/ Scholarships and conditions offered by HNU
(1) Tuition is free.
(2) Hunan University provides 13 months of accommodation for students of this project free of charge. Includes: accommodation in the first year of school, and accommodation in the school in the last month of the second year for the graduation reply.
(3)During the school year, Hunan University provides no less than 2000RMB per month of school-level scholarships for 13 months (including the first year and the last month of the second(or the third) year of returning to school) to support the daily life of international students.
7. Registration Requirements
A. Materials Requirements from Ministry of Education P.R.C
(1)Application Form of Hunan University from http://hnu.17gz.org/
(2)Photocopy of valid passport（The passport used to apply must be the same with passport used for entry into China and registration in Hunan University）
(3)Foreigner Physical Examination Form ( must be within 6 months) (photocopy)（see the format of health report in the attachment）
** All the blanks of the forms must be filled
** A photo is needed on the report
** The photo must be stamped by the hospital
** Doctor must sign at the end of the report
** A hospital stamp is needed at the end
** The date of Health Report is needed
** The full name is required in the first blank which should be the same with passport name.
(4)A formal Graduation and Degree Certificate of Bachelor education(photocopy)
(5)Transcript of your bachelor education (photocopy)
(6)2 recommendation letters(original in English or in Chinese)
(7)Research Proposal of 800 words
(8)Non-criminal Certificate（issued by public security department within 6 months）
** Must be issued by local police station if the student is studying in China
(9)English as mother Tongue/ official language, you should submit the proof that
English is the mother tongue; English as non-native language,
Or prove the previous degree is taught in English;
Or English-learning transcripts with recognition of Hunan University
If you are currently study in China, you need to add following documents
(10)Personal Statement(in English or Chinese the reason of applying for Hunan University)
(11)Proof of Study from Currently University
** The documents above should be original documents in English or in Chinese; otherwise notarized translations in English or Chinese are required
** All the application documents will not be returned whether the application is accepted or not
B. Materials Requirements from School of Design，HNU
1. CV and portfolio
2. Certificate of English Learning such as IELTS (no less than 5.0),TOEFL(no less than 80) ,or CMU-eTEGS in the same level. If student has a good performance in his expertise, we can appropriately reduce English score requirement.
3. Please submit CV , portfolio，Certification of English to zhang_duoduo@hnu.edu.cn.
8．关键时间节点
（1）The deadline for submitting materials in A and B is September 1st, 2019. Students who have passed the review will receive an interview notice before September 10th, 2019 to conduct an online interview. Then, students will receive the offer before September 12th.
（2） The starting date for school is Oct.15th, 2019.
