From January 11 to January 18, a delegation led by XJTU President Zheng Nanning visited four high-ranking universities in the US and Canada.

On the afternoon of January 12, the delegation visited the campus of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL), at the invitation of that university's Chancellor, Harvey Perlman. The two parties reviewed the progress of two jointly sponsored projects: the Confucius Institute, located on the UNL campus, and the American Exchange Center, located on the XJTU campus, participated in the event of "Xi'an Jiaotong University Week" in Nebraska-Lincoln University and discussed plans for joint research and teachers' training center.

On January 14, the delegation traveled to Chicago where they met with the Executive Vice President of the University of Chicago, Dave A. Grene, and the education counselor of the general consulate of Chicago in America Chen Weijia.

On the afternoon of January 15, the delegation was in Canada, where they visited the University of British Columbia, and met with Professor Jack Saddler, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and the Chairman of Bioconversion Network – NSERC.

The delegation next traveled to Calgary, Canada, where they met with President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Calgary, Dr. Elizabeth Cannon. The two parties reached an agreement to cooperate on research in the areas of alternative energy and applied mathematics.