People often talk about how many universities Shenzhen has built, or how many cooperative agreements the Shenzhen government has signed with overseas universities. Less public attention is given to vocational education, which is also crucial in the city's pursuit of high-quality development. 

In its drive to become an international hub for technology and innovation, Shenzhen needs high-end scientific research talent from universities. But the city’s industrial transformation and upgrade cannot be realized without technical professionals, who are mainly cultivated in vocational schools. 

Zhou Mo is based in Shenzhen

That’s exactly why Shenzhen is placing vocational education on a higher level of significance. It recently announced that it will pour 10 billion yuan ($1.5 billion) by the end of 2022 to support the development of vocational education. An additional 18,000 vocational school places will be offered in the next three years.

The aim is to enhance the city’s vocational education to the world-class level and provide a “Shenzhen plan” for China and the world, according to a guideline on boosting the development of Shenzhen’s vocational education issued jointly by the Ministry of Education and Guangdong provincial government in December. The city set a target of turning two to three of its vocational schools and 10 to 15 majors into world-class level by 2025.

In fact, Shenzhen’s efforts to develop vocational education have been ongoing for years. It is now home to 31 vocational schools, with 130,000 enrolled students. Over 26 billion yuan were invested in this educational field during the past five years. 

The city’s renewed push shows its commitment to playing a leading role in driving industrial transformation and upgrade in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area as the southern region, traditionally known as “the world’s factory”, strives to move up the value chain to achieve high-quality growth.

The development of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, 5G, internet of things offers fresh opportunities for Shenzhen’s vocational education to grow in the intelligent era. With such high-tech traditional teaching space, teaching model and teaching method could all be disrupted. 

New challenges are emerging at the same time. Vocational schools need to adapt faster to changes and carry out greater reform on curriculum settings based on technological development in order to cultivate a new generation of technical professionals that fit new market demand. Achieving a “good match” between technical professionals and industrial needs also requires strengthened enterprise-school cooperation. 

Shenzhen is well-positioned to take the role as a pilot city for national reform on vocational education given its strong innovation capability and years of endeavor in the field. The city’s advantage in innovation will help it explore a new path for vocational education development and build a modern vocational education system. The enhanced system will, in turn, help cultivate more outstanding students who are not only technical professionals, but also makers or even creators with strong hands-on skills, further promoting the city’s innovation.

Contact the writer at sally@chinadailyhk.com