Culture

Targeting the 'cluster mode' to build a high-quality vocational education and training system

2026-02-11   

As a key bridge connecting vocational education and industry demand, the quality of practical training directly determines the effectiveness of skill talent cultivation. The traditional training mode has the drawbacks of being scattered, closed, and single, which makes it difficult to meet the new requirements of rapid technological iteration and complex industrial integration for the cultivation of high skilled talents. Promoting the training mode from "isolated school sites" to "regional clusters" and building an open, shared, and collaborative cluster based training system is not only a practical measure to solve the current training difficulties, but also a long-term way to cultivate high skilled talents for the future. Ideal state: The soul of the acquisition of labor skills from the "simulated training ground" to the "real production world" lies in "practical combat". The ideal form of practical training should be a precise mapping and deep immersion of future work, which goes beyond single skill practice and pursues the completion of productive training tasks in real or highly simulated production environments, process flows, and management standards. The key to practical training lies in achieving the integration of teaching and production scenarios. Training bases should no longer be isolated training rooms on campus, but should be built according to modern enterprise standards, and even directly embedded in enterprise production lines or industrial parks, so that students can face real production processes and technical specifications. The core requirement is to promote the integration of the learning process and the work process. Practical training projects are no longer fragmented single skill point exercises, but are designed based on complete and typical work tasks, guiding students through the entire process of requirement analysis, scheme design, implementation and debugging, evaluation and optimization, and cultivating comprehensive skills in solving complex engineering problems and integrating technology. Practical teaching ultimately needs to achieve the unity of academic evaluation and job evaluation. The learning outcomes of students should not only be evaluated through test papers and individual works, but also incorporate multidimensional evaluation criteria such as enterprise standards, customer acceptance, production efficiency, and innovation value, to achieve resonance between teaching evaluation and production needs. Reality dilemma: There is a mismatch between the supply of practical training and industry demand. Although China's vocational education practical training construction has made great progress, facing the new requirements of industrial and vocational education reform, the existing practical training system not only presents a shortage of resources, but also faces challenges in terms of connotation and quality, which restricts the quality and efficiency of high skilled talent cultivation. There is a gap between vocational college training equipment and talent cultivation needs. Schools generally face the dual dilemma of insufficient and outdated training equipment. Most schools, especially those in manufacturing related majors, have insufficient practical training stations per student, which limits students' opportunities for hands-on operation. More importantly, currently, advanced production equipment has high integration, fast updates, and expensive procurement and maintenance costs. It is difficult for schools to maintain continuous updates solely through their own investment, which can easily lead to a disconnect between practical training content and the forefront of the industry. There is a gap between teachers' practical production ability and the demand for practical training teaching. Some vocational school teachers directly teach after graduating from universities, lacking practical experience in frontline production. Practical training teaching is prone to become procedural and theoretical, resulting in insufficient targeting. The overall number of full-time teachers who can guide students in dealing with non-standard and occasional technical problems in real production is relatively short. There is a mismatch between the traditional training mode and the employment needs of modern enterprises. At present, some practical training still focuses on the operation of single equipment and single skills. However, what modern manufacturing urgently needs is composite talents who can connect multiple levels of "collection transmission integration application". These positions require skilled workers not only to be able to operate robotic arms, but also to understand their sensing data collection, network transmission, integrated analysis, and ultimately drive task decision optimization. Adapting to this comprehensive training task that emphasizes system thinking and integration ability across positions and fields is difficult to effectively complete solely through traditional training within a single school. Reform Path: Building the three pillars of a cluster based training system to overcome the above bottlenecks, we can no longer rely on vocational schools to work alone or make small adjustments. We should carry out systematic and ecological reforms, and systematically restructure and optimize the allocation of production and education resources within the region. By building a collaborative community of government, industry, enterprises, and schools, breaking down institutional barriers, fully activating existing training resources from all parties, and constructing a regional and three-dimensional training cluster with "regional public training centers as hubs, on campus training bases as foundations, and off campus enterprise training bases as extensions", we aim to achieve greater sharing, mobility, and value-added of venues, equipment, information, projects, talents, and technologies. Cluster reorganization at the physical space and resource level. Led by the government, industry leaders, and multiple schools, an open and shared regional public training center will be constructed in the industrial agglomeration area. The center focuses on investing in the existing industrial park and is equipped with training venues and facilities that represent high-level industries in the region. It is open to all universities and small and medium-sized enterprises in the region, and mainly undertakes teacher training, technology research and development, skill certification, and comprehensive training projects. Vocational colleges' on campus bases focus on training in basic skills, specialized skills, and pedagogical transformation projects. The off campus base jointly built with cooperative enterprises provides a place for on-the-job internships, practical experience of characteristic projects, and immersion of craftsmanship culture in our school. The three types of practical training have complementary functions and resource sharing, and each type is deeply participated in by the industry, enterprises, and schools in different ways. Carefully design production training projects. The production training project is the core value of the cluster training mode. The key to its design and implementation lies in completing the three-step process of "acquisition conversion implementation". Firstly, it is necessary to obtain real project sources through multiple channels. Make full use of the information hub role of the municipal industry education alliance, actively connect with industry technology needs released by industry departments, enterprise research and development difficulties collected by government science and technology departments, and stable production processes or technical training packages of cooperative leading enterprises. Special attention should be paid to the practical problems faced by small and medium-sized enterprises in technological transformation and process optimization, which are often excellent comprehensive practice projects. Secondly, carry out educational transformation. Decompose and design the complete enterprise tasks into a series of interconnected and gradually deepening "learning tasks" modules, and simultaneously develop supporting task books, guidance manuals, teaching resources, and evaluation plans. Among them, some practical training projects with expensive equipment, high-risk scenarios, and long process cycles should innovatively utilize virtual simulation and digital twin technology, so that students can master the principles and boldly try and make mistakes in the "virtual", hone their hand feel and accumulate experience in the "real". Finally, implement in stages based on the cluster architecture. Especially for complex comprehensive projects, the advantages of clusters should be fully utilized: on campus bases undertake basic cognitive and individual training modules, regional public training centers undertake core modules involving technology integration and shared equipment, and off campus bases undertake personalized modules for system integration, real machine combat, and job verification. Strengthen the positive interaction between practical training and other key teaching elements. If industry, enterprises, and schools are the main clusters of production and education, then key teaching elements such as majors, courses, teachers, textbooks, internships, and practical training constitute the small clusters of vocational education. Building a high-quality training system should not only focus on the training itself, but also establish a positive interactive relationship between training and other key teaching elements, and activate the cluster effect of element linkage reform. On the one hand, practical training planning needs to anchor professional construction goals, project design needs to benchmark course objectives, teaching organization should be jointly built by industry enterprise mentors and school teachers, and teaching implementation requires teaching materials in the form of work orders and loose leaf manuals. On the other hand, the industry dynamics perceived during practical training should become an important reference for adjusting professional dynamics; Real projects from the production line should be the main source of curriculum updates; Teachers should effectively enhance their engineering practice abilities in practical situations; All reform achievements need to be promptly fed back into the new form of textbooks. (New Society)

Edit:Momo Responsible editor:Chen zhaozhao

Source:Guangming Net - Guangming Daily

Special statement: if the pictures and texts reproduced or quoted on this site infringe your legitimate rights and interests, please contact this site, and this site will correct and delete them in time. For copyright issues and website cooperation, please contact through outlook new era email:lwxsd@liaowanghn.com

Recommended Reading Change it

Links