The School of Accounting has secured official approval of its Initial Self-Evaluation Report (iSER) from the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) Initial Accreditation Committee (IAC), marking a pivotal breakthrough in its pursuit of international accreditation. This marks a critical breakthrough for the School on its path to AACSB accreditation, and is a milestone progress for the School to become one of the international elite business schools, which lays a solid foundation for further enhancing the internationalization of the School.

The iSER serves as the core document in the AACSB accreditation process, and its review standards are extremely rigorous. It constitutes not merely a comprehensive institutional self-assessment of educational positioning, resource allocation, and pedagogical systems, but more importantly, a forward-looking roadmap for continuous improvement. To complete the iSER to a high standard, the School, with the strong support of the University, established a three-tier collaborative mechanism of “strategic oversight by leadership, intensive commitment from key faculty, and coordinated engagement of all full-time faculty”. Through this efficient collaborative working mechanism, the School has strictly benchmarked against AACSB accreditation standards, repeatedly polished the report content, and gone through several rounds of revision and optimization. The successful passing of iSER review by our School demonstrates that we have established an internationally aligned framework across strategic planning, teaching quality, faculty development, student advancement, educational resource allocation, and academic/social impact. This is a high recognition of the efforts made by our School in the field of business education.

Founded in 1916 by 16 prestigious institutions including Harvard University, Wharton School, and Columbia University, AACSB is the world's oldest and most selective business school accreditation system, often called the "Crown Jewel of Business Education Accreditation." Held by fewer than 6% of global business schools, this accreditation is universally recognized as the gold standard of educational quality.

Moving forward, the School of Accounting will diligently analyze and develop improvement strategies in response to the IAC feedback, fully aligned with the University's overarching strategic framework, and implement continuous improvement measures based on AACSB's latest Standards, Interpretive Guidance and other official documents, and plan for the Progress Report and the Self-Evaluation Report, in order to receive an on-site visit from the AACSB Peer Review Team as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the School will take the AACSB accreditation as an opportunity to integrate the concept of continuous improvement into its daily teaching, research and social service activities, promote reform and openness through accreditation, and comprehensively enhance the international influence and competitiveness of the accounting discipline in talent cultivation.