General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech at the National Conference on Education laid out a systematic comprehensive plan for accelerating the construction of a leading country in education on the new journey in the new era, which has charted the course forward and provided fundamental guidance for this endeavour.

The Open University of China (OUC) will thoroughly implement the guiding principles of General Secretary Xi's important speech, unswervingly follow the "three fundamental attributes" of education to uphold socialism with Chinese characteristics, take a people-centred approach and serve the national strategies, and focus on the "six core traits" of a leading country in education with strong ideological and political leadership, talent competitiveness, scientific and technological underpinning, livelihood security, social synergy, and international influence. Closely centred on  prioritising the construction of a ubiquitous and accessible lifelong education system, the university aims to enhance and improve the quality of open education, expand and strengthen elderly education, and empower lifelong education through  digitalisation. These efforts will contribute significantly to building a leading country in education, as well as a society and country of learning.

I. To raise political stance and strengthen the sense of responsibility in building a learning-oriented society

Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC), the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, has paid great attention to building a lifelong education system and a learning-oriented society. At the National Conference on Education, General Secretary Xi Jinping underscored the need to fully implement the national education digitisation initiative and make efforts to expand the coverage of high-quality education resources and improve public services for lifelong learning. This fully demonstrates the Party Central Committee's high regard for the construction of a learning-oriented society and further underlines the crucial position and role of lifelong education in the overall situation of building a leading country in education. Throughout history, every global leader in education has made lifelong education a key national strategy for human resource development. As a pillar in the construction of a learning-oriented society in China, the OUC has consistently upheld its mission of serving the lifelong learning needs of the overwhelming majority of the people over its 45 years of operation. By embedding the university within society, it has made unique and irreplaceable historical contributions to the universalization of higher education and the enhancement of human capital quality in China. In pursuit of the goal to become a global leader in education by 2035, there is a need to further strengthen the sense of mission and responsibility. The OUC must leverage its systemic and institutional advantages to identify its role in the historical journey of building a leading country in education and its position in the new objective of the era of building a learning-oriented society. It must create an integrated collaborative new pattern featuring shared growth through collaboration, better meeting the diverse lifelong learning needs of the people, raising the educational attainment of the entire population, and contributing to the construction of a society and country of learning.

II. To serve the national strategy and focus on enhancing public services for lifelong learning

The first is to support the strategy for high-quality population development by enhancing quality in open education. It’s important to steadfastly apply the Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era to educate people. It’s necessary to uphold the distinctive network-based ideological and political education which features the integrated design of degree and non-degree education, coordinated in-class and extracurricular learning, and combined online and offline approaches exploring large-scale online models for ideological and political education. It’s necessary to align with the demands of economic and social development, orienting towards national strategic priorities and regional economic and social development to refine the open university system and enhance the foundational capacity of the education system for quality education delivery. It’s important to implement total factor reform of empowering education and teaching through digital and intelligent technologies. It’s important to optimise the specialty structure and layout to align with economic and social development needs, launch the "101 Plan" for open education, stimulate new growth drivers for fully harnessing its potential, and focus on improving the quality of talent cultivation. It’s important to carry forward the spirit of educators, earnestly implement the initiative to enhance the morale and professionalism of teachers with the ethos of educators, strengthen the professional integrity and conduct of teachers, and cultivate a teaching workforce with “dual capability” for open education, who have both professional expertise and digital intelligence skills.

The second is to support the strategy for actively responding to population aging by expanding and strengthening the Seniors University of China (SUC). It’s important to further improve the planning and layout of the SUC system, extending its reach further into urban and rural communities to establish a nationwide educational network of elderly universities. By adhering to the mission of "Virtue, Learning, Health, Happiness and Accomplishment" in education, it’s necessary to iteratively upgrade the National Education Platform for the Elderly. It’s necessary to take the initiative to develop a series of high-quality national-level exquisite courses to promote proactive health and explore new teaching models that combine experiential, participatory, online, and offline approaches. The SUC will further expand the availability of high-quality elderly education resources, striving to become a “main channel” for elderly education, a “strong guide” for proactive health, and a "catalyst" for the silver economy.

The third is to support the strategy for the opening up of education and create new spaces for exchange and cooperation. It’s important to balance "bringing in" and "going global" and create new digital pathways for “Study in China”. It’s necessary to effectively leverage world-class higher education resources and innovative elements and unite efforts across the education system to build globalized digital campuses. It’s necessary to develop the "Study in China" digital education brand platform and establish overseas learning centres in Africa and BRICS countries. It’s necessary to initiate the joint establishment of the “‘Belt and Road’ Open Education Development Alliance” and the "International Digital University Alliance”. All these efforts aim to promote the sharing of high-quality international digital education resources through consultation, enhancing China’s international influence and voice in open education.

III. To deepen reform and innovation and advance the construction of a learning-oriented society and the development of lifelong education through digital empowerment

The Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) has made a major plan of “promoting the digitalisation of education, empowering the construction of a learning-oriented society, and strengthening the guarantee for lifelong education", which has pointed out  the direction and pathways for constructing a learning-oriented society. The first is to accelerate digital empowerment and strengthen the digital foundation for a learning-oriented society. It’s important to uphold the integration of digital and intelligent technologies, to deepen the innovative application of new-generation information technologies such as artificial intelligence, and innovate in the development of digital universities. A digital education foundation supported by artificial intelligence and big data technologies will be built by leveraging the collective strength of the system. The Smart OUC Integrated Platform and the Lifelong Education Platform will to be developed and effectively utilised to ensure independent, secure, controllable, and sustainable digital service guarantees. A digital resource integration and application centre will be established to create a top-tier integrated, intelligent, and internationalised course supermarket, and explore new models for "Artificial Intelligence+" resource development, thus facilitating the establishment of a digital resource foundation. A digital technology innovation and application centre will be established to explore the deep integration of digital technologies with education and teaching, striving to produce and promote a series of research results of digital technology innovation and application. The second is to strengthen policy support to promote the improvement of lifelong education system guarantees. The establishment of a cross-departmental collaboration mechanism will be promoted to explore the creation of a lifelong learning system based on a qualifications framework, supported by a credit bank platform, and centred around learning outcomes certification. The development of the credit bank will be positioned as a key approach and innovative focus to promote the high-quality development of the education system and accelerate the construction of a learning-oriented nation. The practical application of the credit bank must be further expanded to move faster the establishment and improvement of its organisational system, and develop universal standards and norms. These efforts will drive the integration between vocational education and general education as well as the accumulation and transfer of various learning outcomes. By relying on the credit bank platform, a mechanism for flexible credit recognition and academic degree awarding will be developed to further explore the creation of a new system for duration of schooling and degree structures in digital lifelong learning to provide support for improving lifelong education system guarantees. The third is to strengthen coordination among all parties to build synergy for constructing a learning-oriented society. Building a learning-oriented society is a systematic project that requires coordination across society, collaboration among departments, and synergy across the entire system. The open university system shall leverage its role to build learning-oriented cities with provincial capitals leading the way and prefecture-level cities as the key. Efforts shall be made for the sharing of educational resources and development of public service platforms. A host of exemplary cases for learning community development shall be cultivated and new initiatives in open education shall be utilised to contribute to creating a new ecosystem for a learning-oriented society.

Source: China Education Daily