Building a learning society is critical to meeting current development demands. It is also an important component of realising the Two Centenary Goals and the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation. Based on the requirements of “improving open universities” and a pilot “exploring the building mode of open universities,” both part of the National Outline for Medium and Long-term Education Reform and Development (2010-2020), the Open University of China (OUC) has made positive explorations into the Chinese mode of open universities, and fruitful achievements, rendering powerful assistance to the building of a learning society in China.
When it was established in 2012, the Open University of China (OUC) proposed writing and publishing a Quality White Paper. In 2013, the first annual quality report of the OUC was compiled. Since then, the working mechanism of writing an annual quality report had come into being and has been constantly improved in later work.
The Internet era offers advanced social and technological conditions for the practice of modern and open education. "Smart education" and "smart learning", which are based on information technology and conform to the cultural ideas of modern education, reflect a student-oriented educational concept.
In order to deepen reform, give full play to the guiding function of experts, actively and effectively stimulate the construction of the digital library, and improve the service level of library for education, teaching, and scientific research, on 27th June 2018, a seminar on digital library construction at the Open University of China (OUC) was convened at the OUC’s Wukesong headquarters. President of the OUC Yang Zhijian, vice president of the OUC Li Linshu, committee members from the Steering Committee of the OUC Digital Library Construction, relevant representatives from the branches, and relevant personnel from the library of OUC headquarters participated in the conference.
From 11th -15th June 2018, the Open University of China (OUC) held a seminar for core teachers from its math major. Fifty-nine teachers from 22 provinces and cities attended the seminar. Liu Chen, vice president of the OUC, issued course completion certificates to the teachers.
The unified final examinations for the 2018 spring semester of the Open University of China successfully concluded on 8th July. The examinations were made up of paper examinations and online tests. Paper tests were given on 7th to 8th July, covering 750 subjects and catering to about 4.96 million tests across 3,215 test centres nationwide. The online tests were held from 7th May to 8th July, covering 184 subjects. Within the two months examination period, students are able to sit for several tests; the highest score will be counted. A total of 1.311 million online tests have been registered.
From 4-6th July 2018, a delegation comprised of five people from the Open University of China (OUC) visited Hong Kong to attend the International Conference on Open and Innovative Education (ICOIE) 2018 sponsored by the Open University of Hong Kong (OUHK).
To guarantee the smooth progress of the teaching-reform pilot projects, enhance the implementation of reforms, regulate management, and improve teaching quality, from 26-30 June, 2018, the Experimental School of the Open University of China (OUC) carried out an inspection of its four pilot projects: the internet-based -teaching project; the "skills and literacy" training project; the project connecting vocational with open education; and the project integrating non-degree and degree education. The school received the inspection reports on 5th July.