The 2021 AACSB virtual Asia Pacific Conference was held online from November 17^th to 19^th, prof. ZHAO Yanhai, associate dean of LUSM was invited to attend. Under the theme of “Building Better Outcomes”, the conference was focused on the hot issues and cutting-edge trends of business education involving hybrid and blended learning, internationalization in the Asia Pacific region, societal challenges, experiential learning, lifelong learning, and academic publishing and 2020 accreditation standards and visits.

At the beginning of the conference, Caryn L. Beck Dudley, president &CEO, Geoff Perry, EVP and Chief Officer Asia Pacific of AACSB international, and Jikyeong Kang, President, Chair of AACSB board directors and dean of Asian Institute of Management have delivered welcoming speeches respectively. They praised the progress that business education achieved in the Asia Pacific region during the past year and a half, and expressed appreciation to business schools dedicated to high-quality business education, and to speakers, peers, and volunteers who contributed to the holding of the conference.

At the keynote session, David De Cremer, Provost’s Chair and Professor of the National University of Singapore delivered a speech with the theme “Leading Organization with AI: Challenges and Opportunities”, addressing that business schools should align with the trend of technology development, and to respond to thevaried influence agilely. Shantanu Bhattacharya, Deputy Dean of LKCSB, discussed with Liz Johnson, Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Deakin University, and Manish Sabharwal, Chairman of TeamLease Services (India’s largest staffing solutions provider) on the theme of “Connecting Business Schools and Business through Lifelong Learning”, covering the content of balancing the relationship between teaching, research and industry collaboration.

During the discussion sessions, delegates from Chulalongkorn University, Indian School of Business, UNSW Sydney Business School, Swinburne University of Technology, and Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University carried in-depth discussion on topics as “International Strategy”, “Diversity and Inclusion in Asia Pacific Region”, “Open Access and Academic Publishing” and “Best Practices in Experiential Learning”. And it’s worth mentioning that the conference has set a special virtual booth, demonstrating AACSB’s official portal and its DitaDirect.

The AACB AP Conference is a high-end platform for business schools in the Asia Pacific region learning accreditation trends, exchanging experiences, and sharing perspectives. Currently, the number of AACSB membership institutes in the Asia Pacific region is over 400, providing the “Asia Pacific experiences” and practice support for the innovative development of business education. As one of the members of AACSB, LUSM will continue to align itself with advanced peers, strengthen its feature and promote the assessment of international accreditation, and continuously fulfill its commitment to the sustainable development of responsible business and management education for the Asia Pacific.