The sea surface appears calm, but beneath the waves, hidden currents surge violently. During a maritime exercise, an alarm suddenly sounds inside a submarine compartment. “Suspicious sonar signal detected! Emergency dive!” Lieutenant Li Zhengyuan, the deputy chief engineer, immediately responds to the order. His fingers swiftly operate the control panel, and clear commands spread throughout the entire vessel.

The submarine rapidly descended, causing the hull to tremble slightly. A few minutes later, the hull hovered steadily at the designated depth. In the command cabin, Li Zhengyuan focused intently on the display screen, calmly issuing subsequent adjustment commands while meticulously monitoring every parameter change to ensure the stability of the hull’s position.

A year ago, Li Zhengyuan was still a fourth-year student at the Naval Engineering University. Today, he has grown into a capable deputy chief engineer. When speaking about Li Zhengyuan, the ship’s leadership remarked, “In previous years, graduates from the electrical and mechanical engineering program needed a considerable amount of time to adapt to their roles. However, now, students like Li Zhengyuan can hit the ground running, and the changes have been remarkable.”

This significant transformation was made possible thanks to the proactive educational reforms undertaken by the Naval Engineering University. Years ago, Professor Peng Likun and his team conducted in-depth research on the front lines of submarine units. They discovered that the knowledge acquired in academic settings did not match the actual requirements of military positions, making it difficult for students to quickly develop combat capabilities.

“Wherever the demands of the battlefield are, there must be the focus of talent cultivation.” Peng Likun’s team adhered to the principle of “demand-driven and practical-oriented” and thoroughly analyzed the core competency requirements of each position within the units. Subsequently, with support from universities, they redesigned the curriculum system. They innovated teaching methods, extending the classroom to the front lines of training and exercises. They significantly increased the proportion of practical instruction and established a hierarchical, step-by-step, and closely aligned practical training system to enable students to hone their skills in a simulated battlefield environment. At the same time, they reformed the assessment and evaluation mechanisms, incorporating key indicators such as battlefield adaptability and military command proficiency into the evaluation criteria.

The effectiveness of the curriculum reform was quickly evident in the training and exercise fields. Graduating student Zuo Jingsheng completed the emergency departure preparations in the shortest time possible during a major training exercise. Graduating student Deng Xiaohu, upon his first execution of a cross-regional mobile emergency mission, successfully completed the task thanks to his strong capabilities… Today, the experience gained from building this curriculum has been incorporated into the guidelines for the reform of naval academies’ teaching methods, providing a replicable “model” for addressing the issue of “disconnection between teaching and warfare”.

In the evaluation of top military courses, Professor Peng Likun’s innovative “Submarine Operation” course was successfully selected. This not only affirms the success of curriculum reforms but also vividly demonstrates the precise alignment of military academy personnel training with battlefield needs.

From military academy classrooms to deep-sea battlefields, batches of outstanding cadets like Li Zhengyuan are rapidly developing into the backbone of military combat capability through their solid professional skills and robust practical combat abilities. The synchronous resonance between academies and military units has made personnel training increasingly effective, providing an endless source of motivation for the Navy’s deep-sea endeavors and its quest for maritime strength. (Looking into the New Era)