WebSite:    http://chenghuan.lnnu.edu.cn

    The School of Urban and Environmental Sciences is the former Geography Branch Lvda Teachers School founded in November 1951, which was one of the earliest departments in the school. It began to enroll the two-year junior students formally in September 1952, the Geography Branch became the Geography Department in September 1958 and it began to enroll the undergraduates of the Geography Science (Education). In 1985, it began to enroll the graduate students. Since the 1990s, to meet the training needs of the development of social economy, it began to cultivate the students who are not majoring in education. It established the Major of Development and Management of Land Resources (junior school) in 1992. It established the Major of Resources Environment and the Management of Urban and Rural Planning in 1999 .The Geographic Information Systems Major started in 2000. In December 2000, with the Institution of Marine Resources merging in; the Geography Department was renamed the School of Urban and Environmental Sciences. It began to recruit the doctoral candidate in 2003. In 2005, it established the Hydrology and Water Resources Engineering Department. In 2010, it began to enroll the post doctorates. 

    Generations of Geography People have worked hard, adhering to the school motto --- “be a model of virtue and eruditeness for others”, and the school has become the only cultivation center for advanced talents of geography  and research base of geography in Liaoning province which has both normal and non-normal majors with the titles of  masters, bachelors and doctorates.

    The school has four teaching departments: Department of Geographical Science, Department of the Resources and Environment System, Department of Geographic Information Science and Department of Hydrology and Water Resources Engineering. There are six research centers: Surface Process Research Center, the Space Information Research Center, Regional Ecological Environment Research Center, Human Habitat Environment Research Center, Hydrology and Water Resources Research Center and the Regional Economic Research Institute. Now the School has the advanced teaching level and research facilities in China, which is worth more than 20 million Yuan; the teaching and scientific research experiment space is more than 3000 square meters. The school has the scientific moving station for the geographic post-doctorates , the Ministry of Education Humanities Social Sciences Research Centers: Marine Economy and the Sustainable Development Research Center, the main Laboratory of Natural Geography and Spatial Information Science of Liaoning province, the innovation  team of Liaoning province(Marine Economics Geography), the Provincial Experimental Teaching Demonstration Center (Geography Laboratory and teaching Center). At present the school has first grade disciplines of geography entitled for conferring doctorate degree (including three of the secondary disciplines entitled for conferring doctorate: Humanity Geography, Physical Geography, Cartography and Geographic Information System). The school also has first grade geographic disciplines entitled for conferring master degrees.( including three  of the secondary disciplines entitled for conferring master degree : Curriculum and Teaching Methodology (geography), Environmental Science, Ecology, Hydrology and Water Resources, Quaternary Geology, as well as the disciplines entitled for conferring master of education and master of public administration (MPA).  Geography is first-class discipline of “the construction of the characteristic discipline for enhancing core competitiveness of schools and universities in Liaoning province”. It is also the important discipline in Liaoning province. The Humanity Geography, Physical Geography, Cartography and Geographic Information System are all the secondary disciplines of Liaoning province.

    The School has a reasonably structured high-quality faculty team. There are 50 staff including 40 full-time teachers. Among the teachers, there are 1 senior Double hired academician, 15 professors, 15 associate professors, 1 senior engineer, 3 senior experimenters, which shows reasonable structure of titles and ages. There are 10 doctoral supervisors, 28 master tutors, 4 teachers who get into the “pacesetter project” entitled by the Department of Education in Liaoning province. There are 5 visiting professors. Among the teachers, there are 24 teachers who have the doctoral degrees (including 3 post-doctorates, 2 who got Ph.D. abroad). Now there are 6 PhD candidates, mainly working at Peking University (2), Tsinghai University (1), Wuhan University(2), Nanjing University (2), Chinese Academy of Sciences(3), etc. After a long period of construction, Teacher's Discipline Direction has formed the characteristic scientific research team in the following 6 disciplines: Marine Economic Geography and Sustainable Development, Human Habitat Environment and Regional Ecological Natural Resources Evaluation and Development, Environmental Evolution and Natural Disasters, Geographic Information System Integration and Application, Remote Sensing Image Information Processing.  The teachers have formed a young, vibrant, united and progressive teaching and research team.

    Our school fully relies on the advantage of the disciplines and scientific research platform and pay attention to cultivate students' practical ability, innovation ability and comprehensive quality. It has formed a distinctive, relatively complete multi-level talent cultivation system. The system of undergraduate geography teaching is quite sound and full of characteristics. There are four undergraduate majors: Geography Science (education), Resources Environment and the Management of Urban and Rural Planning , Geographic Information System and the Hydrology and Water Resources Engineering,  there are  more than 600 undergraduate students in our school. Geography Science (education) is the provincial Specialty major. Professor Lin Xiansheng was awarded Provincial Teaching Masters. Curriculum and Teaching Methodology(geography) was awarded Provincial Excellent Courses. The school has published a series of geographical teaching materials and won several provincial and city level awards. The graduate education has the large scale and high level. There are 300 graduate students and more than 20 doctoral candidates. More than 2000 undergraduate students have graduated. More than 300 students had got master's degree and more than 30 students had got doctoral degree. Most of them have become the leading persons in their work such as the principals of the primary and secondary school, and some of them even become municipal and provincial leaders.  The School actively carry out international cooperation , which has signed with the Indiana State University of the "2 + 1" model of joint training double master's degree programs of geography major  in international cooperation.

    From the “10th 5-Year Plan” to“ 11th Five-Year Plan”period, the school teachers carry out high quality academic research and get plenty research achievement.  The school is responsible for 1 national science and technology support plan project, 2 national No.973 project ,3  national No. 863 projects, 18 national natural/social science fund projects, 2 international cooperation projects, more than 200 provincial scientific research projects, more than 300  entrusted projects by government departments and enterprises and institutions entrusted projects. The school has obtained scientific research funds more than 40million Yuan and , published over 20 monographs and more than 600 academic papers, along with more than 100 pieces are recorded by SCI, EI and ISTP. There are 2 computer software copyrights.  The research achievements won more than 20 provincial and municipal Science and Technology Progress Prize and the Philosophy and Social Science Prize and other 100 scientific and technological achievements rewards. The teachers take part in the academic communication and participate in domestic and foreign high-level academic conferences more than 30 times. They undertook 5 academic conferences including the China-Germany Regional Planning Research of International Academic Exchange, China Quaternary Science Academic Seminar and other high-level academic conference. The school actively carries out academic exchanges home and abroad, setting up scientific cooperation relationship with the schools and universities in the United States, Britain, Japan and other countries. The school has carried out the international cooperation projects with Japan Fukuoka University and builds successively cooperation relationship with Beijing University, Wuhan University, Capital Normal University, Northeast Geography Institute of Chinese Academy of Sciences, the National Marine Environmental Monitoring Center. 

    Facing the whole country, our school enrolls 150-180 students every year in four undergraduate majors. There are 5 - 6 classES each year. There are 2-3 classes about 60-90 students each year of the Geography Science (education) Department.  There are 1-2 classes about 30-60 students of the Geographic Information Systems Department. There is 1 class for 30 students in Resources Environment and the Management of Urban and Rural Planning Major. There is 1 class for 30 students of the Hydrology and Water Resources Engineering Department. Facing the whole country, the school recruits more than 100 postgraduate students working on academic, professional master degrees: Master of Education and Master of Public Administration. The school recruits 10-20 doctoral candidates. The graduates’ employment situation is good and the proportion of the undergraduate students who study abroad and continue to work on master’s degrees is 30% on average. Our graduates are generally welcomed by the society, and the employment rate stays above 95%. The need of various professional school graduates becomes larger with the strategic adjustment of national economic development, strategy implementation of Liaoning Coastal Economic Belt and the digital earth, digital city and digital ocean construction. The social demand is increasing year by year and graduate employment prospect is good.