On November 6, thought weekly & political sound column on the 16th edition of Xinhua Daily published a theoretical article by Zhang Jian, vice President of Suzhou Vocational University, entitled cultivating the best craftsmen for the Belt and Road. Based on the theory and practice, this artical systematically introduces the experience and practice of SVUl in helping the countries along the Belt and Road to cultivate application-oriented talents from a global perspective. The full text is cited below:

Best “craftsman” for the Belt and Road

Zhang Jian

It is the responsibility and obligation of higher vocational education workers in the new era to study and implement the spirit of the 19th CPC national congress, comprehensively enhance the internationalization level of higher vocational education, and enhance the influence of Chinese education in the world. Entering a new era and showing new achievements, vocational education needs to plan the reform and development of vocational education from a global perspective, promote vocational education to the world, accelerate the construction of world-class vocational colleges, and cultivate application-oriented talents with international competitiveness.

First of all, we should consult the international advanced vocational education institutions to build an application-oriented university of production-education integration with Chinese characteristics. To promote international cooperation, vocational universities need to constantly adjust the structure of discipline, specialty and talent training, focus on optimizing the training mode of badly needed talents, take the initiative to cultivate domestic and foreign application-oriented talents needed by future technology and industry, and improve the ability of vocational education to serve economic and social development. We have introduced the high-quality educational resources of Australia's famous vocational education and training institution, Chisholm Institute, localized the TAFE mode in Australia, innovated the talent training mode of Sino-foreign cooperation projects, created a distinctive practical skills training system, and achieved mutual recognition of credits and international standards. In order to create an international highland of characteristic talent training, SVU cooperates with German Lucas-Nulle China co., LTD to build the Sino-German automobile vocational qualification training and certification center. The center, with the introduction of the German dual system vocational education system and standards, combined with the actual demand in local area, with localization development philosophy of complementary advantages, adjusting measures to local conditions, creates an international automobile professional practice training teaching system with Chinese characteristics and explores the practice in the center construction, teacher training, international authentication, international exchange and so on. In addition, inspired by the new development space under the Belt and Road Initiative, it undertakes the responsibility and obligation of vocational education to go global, and makes efforts to explore the internationalization of vocational education based on the previous experience of foreign aid and opening-up education. The two sides strive to build the center into a domestic and international first-class automobile training and certification center, providing international vocational qualification training for students, social and enterprise technicians and international personnel along the Belt and Road.

Secondly, the international pattern of school-enterprise cooperation should be established to find a way to cultivate international talents. The Belt and Road Initiative has brought about a new round of all-round opening up, which has further radiated the spirit of craftsman in big countries and provided support for the training of application-oriented talents in countries along the Belt and Road, which is the responsibility and responsibility of higher vocational universities. To enhance the international influence of vocational education, we need to build an international school-enterprise cooperation mechanism and further deepen cooperation with multinational enterprises and international chamber of commerce. Higher vocational colleges need to cultivate talents for enterprises to go global, and enterprises provide training bases, jobs and other high-quality conditions for colleges to cultivate application-oriented talents. Such a virtuous cycle enables vocational education to better serve enterprises to go global. SVU and light cable industry of Suzhou jointly set up the university of light cable industry which provides innovative thinking and mode of cooperation in terms of talent training, corporate training, social services and so on. It funds outstanding students to go abroad for further study, introduces international craftsmen elite, and organizes exchange of visits between international industries to serve the elite talents in the industry through international interaction. At the same time, it cooperates with Hengtong group to run schools abroad, and through the form of enterprise order classes in overseas branches, it cultivates technical personnel who have feelings for China, understand Chinese culture, and are familiar with Chinese equipment and technical standards.

Thirdly, the internationalization standards of the teaching staff should be improved to clear the bottleneck of international communication and cooperation. To spread Chinese stories around the world, we need more storytellers. Higher vocational colleges need to cultivate a group of international talents with international vision who are familiar with international rules and able to participate in international affairs and international competition, so as to provide human resources guarantee for improving the internationalization standards of SVU. This requires teachers to enhance their international vision and ensure the quality of teachers in cooperative education programs and international student programs. According to the needs of the Belt and Road industry layout, we attach importance to teacher training in professional teaching ability, foreign language teaching ability, international understanding of education and other aspects. In recent years, SVU has organized more than 100 full-time teachers to attend TAE training in Australia, and all of them have obtained international teacher certificates. SVU has organized more than 60 backbone teachers to attend summer professional training in Germany, Canada, Japan and New Zealand. At the same time, the international registered Chinese teacher training was organized, and senior international Chinese teachers were invited to train 10 participating teachers to help them obtain the IPA international registered Chinese teacher qualification certificates. (the author is Vice President of Suzhou Vocational University)