During its Labour-Appreciation Month in May, the Open University of China (OUC) invited staff and students across its system to share stories of “Craftspeople and Model Workers Around Us.” The call received an enthusiastic response. These stories vividly illustrate how students and staff stay grounded, strive for excellence and devote themselves to serving their communities.

1. School of Metal Castings – MO Junchao: Holding Fast to Craft, Passing on the Craftsmanship Spirit

MO Junchao, a National Technical Expert, is skilled in multiple casting processes and familiar with casting materials. He has co-developed key components for high-speed rail, automotive and construction-machinery sectors, led the drafting of several enterprise and international standards, and earned eight patents, six professional awards and eleven prize-winning published papers. With dedication, focus and innovation, he keeps pushing technological upgrades and team growth, helping power the company’s leap-forward development.

2. School of Metal Castings – JIA Wangliang: Craftsmanship Forged in the Furnace

JIA Wangliang, CPC member and National Technical Expert, stands at the melting furnace every day. Together with his crew, he casts both Kehua’s products and his own youth in steel and fire. He knows real craftsmanship is not grand speeches but creating value with his own hands amid sparks and molten metal.

3. School of Metal Castings – DUAN Wenheng: Ambition, Diligence, and Ingenuity

Inside the CRRC Qishuyan Institute foundry, railway, high-speed-rail and automotive parts roll off the line in neat succession, while workers move briskly along the assembly stations. One operator in work wear concentrates on the console of a medium-frequency induction furnace, eyes fixed on the metal as it shifts from solid to molten, then to glowing iron.

Thanks to years at the front line, he can gauge metallurgical quality solely by the colour and flow of the melt. The operator mentioned is DUAN Wenheng - once an ordinary melter, now a casting expert honoured as a company model worker and a National Technical Expert.

DUAN remains rooted to the production line, embodying dedication, precision, focus and innovation to the full. Striving for excellence from his own post, he keeps scaling new professional heights and, through concrete actions, interprets the modern responsibility of a model-worker craftsman.

4. School of Metal Castings – ZHANG Xiang: Craftsmanship Makes Excellence

ZHANG Xiang, probationary CPC member, won first place in the die-casting fitter category of the 2020 National Vocational Skills Competition and was named National Technical Expert. He went on to receive the Nanhai “Great-City Craftsman” title (2021), Foshan Model Worker (2021) and Guangdong May 1st Labour Medal (2024).

Nineteen years of hard work have made him an industry leader. His journey shows that craftsmanship is an ever-burning beacon and solid work the ladder to the summit.

By OUC