Stewards of the Universities
Higher education has been a key part of Macau's shift from a gaming town toward a diversified city. At the University of Macau, Zhao Wei趙偉 · Wei ZhaoThe 8th Rector of the University of Macau (2008–2017), Wei Zhao is a computer scientist. He earned a B.S. in physics from Shaanxi Normal University (1982), then an M.S. (1983) and PhD (1986) in computer science from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Before Macau he chaired the computer-science department and served as senior associate vice president for research at Texas A&M University, and was dean of science at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. As Rector he led the construction of the new Hengqin campus and the 2014 relocation, transforming UM from a local institution into a comprehensive university with Asian influence; he is an IEEE Fellow (2001). He stepped down at the end of 2017 and joined the American University of Sharjah as Chief Research Officer in 2018; the termination of his contract briefly became a public controversy and was the subject of a government-ordered investigation.Read profile → oversaw the move to the new Hengqin campus during his rectorship, and was succeeded as rector by Song Yonghua宋永華 · Yonghua SongThe 9th Rector of the University of Macau, in office since 9 January 2018. A power-systems engineer who earned his PhD from the China Electric Power Research Institute in 1989, Song spent two decades teaching and serving as a pro-vice-chancellor across British universities (Brunel, Bristol, Bath, Liverpool), was Assistant President of Tsinghua University from 2009, and from November 2012 to December 2017 served as Executive Vice President of Zhejiang University, founding its International Campus in Haining. He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering (2004), an IEEE Fellow (2008), and a Member of Academia Europaea (2019); his research concerns the safe and efficient operation of low-carbon power systems. He received the Macao SAR Medal of Merit – Education in 2023.Read profile →, who continued to build research strength; at the Macau University of Science and Technology, Xu Ao'ao許敖敖 · Xu Ao'aoThe 2nd President of the Macau University of Science and Technology (2002–2012), Xu Ao'ao is an astronomer and higher-education leader. Born in 1940 in Changzhou, Jiangsu, he graduated from the astronomy department of Nanjing University in 1962 and stayed on to teach, working for decades in solar physics, space physics, and plasma physics; he later became a professor and doctoral supervisor in astronomy and served as provost and vice-president of Nanjing University. In 2002 he became President of MUST, succeeding founding president Chow Lai-ko, and over the next decade helped grow the comprehensive university — founded in 2000 — in disciplinary strength and scale, stepping down in 2012 and later serving as adviser to the MUST chancellor. He was a member of the 9th and 10th National CPPCC.Read profile → served as an early president and laid the foundations of that private university.
Cultivators of the Classroom
Beyond the universities, basic education has been quietly upheld by generations of educators. Lau Sin Peng劉羨冰 · Lau Sin PengA veteran Macao educator and historian of education. Born in 1934 in Zhongshan, Guangdong, she moved to Macao in 1950 and devoted more than forty-eight years to Macao's Chinese-language education. From 1984 to 2000 she was principal of the Commercial Night Secondary School attached to the Macao Chinese General Chamber of Commerce, and long served as President of the Macao Chinese Educators Association, a standing member of the Macao Education Committee, and a member of the MSAR Preparatory Committee. Through part-time study from 1985 to 1993 she earned a master's degree in education from South China Normal University in Guangzhou. She is the author of A History of Macao Education (People's Education Press, 2002) and Traces of a Century: A Chronicle of 20th-Century Macao Education, systematic works on the local lineage of Macao schooling; she received the Macao SAR Medal of Merit – Education in 2001.Read profile → taught for decades and studied the history of Macau education, while was at once an educator and a calligrapher, witnessing and shaping Macau's cultural and educational life across a century-long life.
This series, grounded in the public record, presents their education, posts, and contributions — letting readers see how "education" became the city's most enduring investment.
