Since its establishment, the institute has focused on hosting significant academic conferences, inviting influential international scholars, cultivated cross-cultural exchanges, and has provided a wide range of university, business, or social service training to enhance IC awareness and competence in China. It also has a strong academic record in hosting conferences, designing research projects, and developing publications for the IC field in China, which will be covered in the next essay.

The SISU Intercultural Institute (SII) was launched in conjunction with organizing and hosting an international conference, and has continued to be active as a co-organizing partner in a number of significant conferences.  The proposal for establishing such a center coincided with organizing the

“China Communicating Internationally and Interculturally” sub-conference in the 2^nd World Forum on China Studies (with the SASS, September 21-22, 2006), and those scholars provided research training at the 1st International Intercultural Research Methods Symposium (September 26, 2006). Since then the institute has co-hosted five more international symposium for student, faculty, city-, and nation-wide IC disciplinary development, including two on Cross-cultural Management (2009, 2011) at SISU, two comparing Sino-German IC disciplinary development in cooperation with Prof. Juergen Henze of Humboldt University of Berlin (both in 2010), and a national IC teaching seminar with the Sino-FLT Teaching Research Institute (in 2011). >> More

To further stimulate developments of the IC field, the SII annually invites a number of well-known scholars to give lectures or hold training classes at SISU, and also often to visit other neighboring institutions to further cooperation and research development in China and the Shanghai/Jiangnan area. A long list of guest professors have provided lecture or training series to develop IC research skills, including scholars like L. Robert Kohls, Rosita Daskal Albert and Michael H Prosser’s IC Founders Lecture Series (Spring, 2004, 2005), Guo-Ming Chen and Linda Beamer’s IC Research Approaches lectures (May, 2006), Myron Lustig’s IC Quantitative Research Methodology training series (Spring, 2008, 2009). >> More

The institute also seeks to develop its graduates, providing exchange opportunities, assisting some in publishing their research papers, and preparing others for effective careers in teaching, training, or business.

Each year the SII sends 2-5 post-graduates to the Intercultural Communication Institute (ICI) in Portland, Oregon, USA to serve as interns or participate in the Summer Institute of Intercultural Communication (SIIC). A new exchange has been developed with the Intercultural and American Studies of Bayreuth University in Germany, and 4 of our students are currently taking coursework and writing their theses there (2012).  We also seek to stay in touch with students after graduation, and since 2002 have encouraged the beginnings of an alumni network. Our graduates have reported that being part of the SII “IC Family” continues to encourage them in making greater contributions to society in this age of globalization and intercultural exchanges. >> More

In addition, the SII provides assistance to varied departments or organizations for improving IC teaching or training (like offering course in the SISU MBA “international soft-skills” management module). Course content developed by SII are now being used in various colleges (and some popular lectures can be found online) and SII faculty are active teaching courses or training others in IC course design or teaching methodologies (like the sessions offered for the SINO-FLTT seminars in 2007, 2009, and co-sponsored in 2011) Moreover, SII also provides intercultural consulting and training for a number of public service organizations, such as the Shanghai Foreign Service Company (FESCO) and the International Broadcasting Channel (IBC) of Shanghai Media Group (SMG). >> More