The Ministry of Education has officially approved the establishment of Bari College of Shandong University of Science and Technology, to be jointly run by Shandong University of Science and Technology (SDUST) and the Polytechnic University of Bari, Italy. It is the University's second Sino-foreign cooperative education institution without independent legal-entity status, after Swinburne College, and marks a new breakthrough in SDUST's internationalization.

Bari College will enroll its first students in 2026, with a total planned capacity of 1,720. It will offer four undergraduate programs — Big Data Management and Application (program code 120108TH), Industrial Engineering (120701H), Environmental Engineering (082502H), and Electrical Engineering and Automation (080601H) — each with an annual intake of 100 students. It will also offer two master's programs conferring foreign degrees, in Management Engineering and Electrical Engineering, each admitting 30 students a year.

Undergraduate students follow a "4+0" model, completing all four years of full-time study at the Jinan Campus. Those who meet the graduation and degree requirements of both institutions will receive a graduation certificate and a bachelor's degree from SDUST, along with a bachelor's degree from the Polytechnic University of Bari. Master's students follow a "2+0" model, completing the full two years at the Jinan Campus; those who meet the Polytechnic University of Bari's degree requirements will be awarded its master's degree.

The Polytechnic University of Bari is a core member of the Italian network of polytechnic universities, and its engineering programs are well regarded across Europe. It placed 556th in the QS World University Rankings 2026.