Up to 15 universities in Beijing will establish new campuses in Xiong'an New Area, as part of the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, it was announced at an industrial forum in the capital on Sunday.

Four universities to be located in the Xiong'an — Beijing Jiaotong University, Beijing University of Science and Technology, Beijing Forestry University and China University of Geosciences (Beijing) — have already started construction of their Xiong'an campuses.

Details were revealed during the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Education Collaborative Development Forum.

Up to 202 primary and secondary schools and kindergartens in Beijing and Tianjin have established educational partnerships with 273 local counterparts in Hebei province, which is one of the fruits of the coordinated development in the education sector.

The forum also included the release of a report related to the collaborative development of education in the region indicating that even though progress has been made over the past decade, there are still disparities in the development levels across the three areas. While Beijing and Tianjin hold leading positions in national educational development, education in Hebei province is lagging, according to the report.