Not Necessarily the First

Abstract

The Newsmakers item “Opening up” (11 May, p. [811][1]) states that “German physicist Romano Rupp of the University of Vienna in Austria has become the first non-Chinese person to be named science dean at a Chinese university.” In fact, George W. Groff, a Penn State graduate in horticulture, was dean of the College of Agriculture at Canton Christian College in Guangzhou, China, from 1922 to 1941 ([1][2]). Canton Christian College became Lingnan University, whose College of Agriculture merged with that of Sun Yat Sen University in 1952 to form South China Agricultural College, now South China Agricultural University, with a current enrollment of 36,000 students. Groff began teaching horticulture in China in 1907, beginning a century of partnership between Penn State and South China Agricultural University that is still thriving in the form of training and research collaboration in plant biology, including a joint Laboratory of Root Biology inaugurated by the presidents of South China Agricultural University and Penn State on May 29 of this year. Rupp appears to be (at least) 85 years late to merit the title of “first non-Chinese science dean at a Chinese university.” 1. 1.[↵][3] Lingnaam Agric. Rev. 1 , 1 (1922). [1]: /lookup/doi/10.1126/science.316.5826.811e [2]: #ref-1 [3]: #xref-ref-1-1 View reference 1. in text