Is it a worldwide problem that theory is divorced from practice in university engineering education? The biggest reason is that a large number of engineering professors lack engineering practice experience from school to school, and they can't really connect with engineering practice from curriculum setting to teaching. The United States and Canada started the cooperative education system very early, that is, cooperative education, which is really the result of the cooperation between universities and industry. Students' learning is repeated alternately in the classroom and in the industry. To a great extent, the cooperative system has made up for the problem of the disconnection between theory and practice in the teaching of engineering universities.

The greatest economic achievement of reform and opening up is the great development of "Made in China". "Made in China 2025" will be the key to the sustainable development of China's economy in the future, and engineering education will provide a talent base. China has made great achievements in engineering education, and the great development of manufacturing in China is also inseparable from this. However, China's engineering education is still a traditional model, focusing on classroom education and practical graduation design. This is a further historical requirement, and reform is the top priority. This cooperative system is worth learning from the engineering education of China University. Observer Network released "Work-integrated learning to promote scientific and technological innovation and entrepreneurship"

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This paper introduces the cooperative system, but Guo Wenyong's view of work-study program is easily misunderstood. There are essential differences between cooperative system and traditional work-study program. Earning some living expenses during study is not the main purpose of cooperative system, which has nothing to do with scientific and technological innovation in colleges and universities.

For many people, science and engineering are often confused, but science and engineering are very different. Science is mainly based on science education, and graduates are mainly engaged in scientific exploration. The basic feature of scientific exploration is to start from the known and explore the unknown through theoretical or experimental methods. Because the real world is highly complex, the disciplines of scientific exploration are becoming more and more detailed. On the other hand, there are many overlapping fields between highly specialized disciplines, forming a large number of marginal disciplines and becoming new exploration contents.

Engineering focuses on engineering education and graduates engage in engineering practice. Lord. The characteristics of engineering practice are: given a specific problem, there are ready-made tools to solve it, and tools should be solved if there are no ready-made tools; If there is an accurate and rigorous method, use the accurate and rigorous method; if not, use the approximate method; if it is really not feasible, estimate by experience, and then put the safety factor at the bottom. Engineering method has the best theoretical basis. If not, as long as it works. Because the problems in the real world are completely presented and often do not conform to the idealized hypothetical framework on which theoretical methods are based, it is not so much science as art to judge whether specific methods, data and experiences are applicable. The key to engineering practice is to solve problems safely, reliably and economically with limited time and resources, and creativity is secondary. All these decide that engineering education is different from science education.

On the other hand, engineering technology started earlier than modern science. When there is no scientific method, people are already building bridges and houses, making cars and ships. When there is no scientific method to guide, we can only rely on experience and trial and error. When we go further than the existing experience, we can only rely on the safety factor to ensure that there will be no problems. When Michelangelo built St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome, he wanted to build a big dome like the Pantheon in Rome, but he lacked scientific calculation methods and had to add materials. Finally, the bottom of the dome seat is more than one meter thick. This of course caused waste, but in the absence of accurate methods and data, this is also a typical engineering method. With the development of modern scientific methods, engineering technology has become more scientific, not only with sophisticated tools, but also with fine thinking. This is progress in itself, not a problem. The problem lies in engineering education. With the refinement and deepening of engineering science, the starting point of engineering research is getting higher and higher. It takes a long time to reach the starting line, and it takes a lot of time, energy and resources to move forward. In theory, it is ideal to carry out engineering research and engineering practice alternately, but in fact, such opportunities are few and there is no time. Unfortunately, this has caused engineering professors to focus on engineering research background and lack engineering practice. Engineering methods are becoming more and more detailed, and more and more things must be mastered, which objectively causes the problem of insufficient class hours. People who engage in engineering practice lack sufficient theoretical background and are "unqualified" for engineering teaching. Engineering education is the separation of theory and practice.

Engineering practice is not only the accumulation of technology, tools and methods. Engineering technology has both scientific and artistic aspects. This art is not piano, chess, calligraphy and painting, but intuition, experience, judgment and many things that can only be expressed but not expressed under the condition of limited resources, incomplete information and uncertainty. For example, the equipment of military books is like science, which has certain rules, but engineering technology is like leading troops to fight, and dogmatism kills people.

Engineering practice also requires team efforts. Nowadays, the spirit of artisans is advocated, but artisans operate under the technical direction set by engineers. Just like in the army, an experienced old monitor plays a very important role, but he is still a platoon leader who directs the battle. However, the headquarters is not only commanding officers, but also needs to communicate the operational plan, get the understanding, support and supplement of officers and men, and improvise according to the command intention. For engineers, a given problem is just the beginning, and it is necessary to deeply understand the nature, scope, history and lessons of the problem. All this starts with communication.

Engineers not only need organizational leadership, teamwork spirit and communication skills, but also need to understand and be familiar with various industry regulations and standards, and also need to understand and be familiar with the company's internal workflow and engineering standards. Mechanical understanding is not enough. On the basis of understanding and respect, reasonably explain and fill the gray space between various regulations. Most importantly, engineers exist not because of personal hobbies or dedication to their careers, but to help companies make profits or owners achieve specific business or public welfare goals. Engineers must be good at daily work according to the company's operating objectives. Engineering science and "engineering art" both have their own strengths and team spirit, and can work effectively with limited resources and incomplete information. This is the heroic nature of an engineer.

But these are the contents that are rarely involved in university engineering education. Moreover, it is easy for engineering education to list all kinds of specific engineering methods in a systematic and in-depth framework, and it is done extensively, but it loses the overall situation. If you are not careful, it is easy for you to see only the trees and not the Woods. For college students who have not yet entered the profession, they only know how to learn a lot of theorems and methods, but they don't know how to relate to specific engineering problems and how to locate various methods in engineering practice. This phenomenon is not uncommon. But in fact, this thing is not so terrible. You can master it if you sink your heart and do it. It's like cooking. If you always look at recipes and cooking skills, you will only get more and more scared. You really roll up your sleeves and dry them. That's it. It's almost delicious. You can keep cooking when you are full. In other words, engineering is actually learning by doing and learning by doing.

It is not a new problem that engineering education is divorced from engineering practice. 190 1 Herman Schindler, a professor of new disciplines at Lihai University in the United States, noticed that students who had worked for some time before coming to college were obviously more mature, and their study was more purposeful and effective, as were students who worked outside the school. Of course, this is not a part-time job such as delivering takeout food and carrying big items on the construction site, but a short-term job related to the major. Inspired by such an example, he began to imagine a system of cooperative education between universities and industry, which was the beginning of the concept of cooperative education. 1903, Schindler was hired by the University of Cincinnati to teach; 1905, the university of Cincinnati decided to support him to set up a one-year cooperative course, but if the experiment fails, the university will be irresponsible. In 2005, the Council of the University of Cincinnati decided again that the experimental period was over, and after 100 years, the university was finally fully responsible for the cooperative system.

Of course, Schindler's experiment was successful, and the University of Cincinnati's decision to take full responsibility in 2005 was just a form of reinvention, which was unnecessary at all. Schindler was later promoted from assistant professor to dean of engineering college and served as acting president of the University of Cincinnati, largely because of the prestige brought by the success of the cooperative system. Now there is a statue of him on the campus of the University of Cincinnati. There are many cows in colleges and universities, and it is not easy to build a statue. Schindler's contribution and reputation in academic circles can be imagined. Moreover, in 2006, the University of Cincinnati also established the Hall of Fame for Cooperative Education, which shows our importance.

In the United States, Northeastern University, Antioch College, Kettering University restructured from General Motors College, Delecque Searle University and even Purdue University are the backbone of the cooperative system. Many universities that implement the cooperative system also form national academic institutions, which are responsible for coordinating affairs, exchanging relevant experiences and formulating common standards, such as ASEE. In Canada, the University of Waterloo took the lead in running a cooperative school on 1957. Since then, most universities with engineering departments have set up cooperative courses, and CAFCE is responsible for cooperative education in Canadian universities. Now cooperative education extends from engineering to society, art and medicine. Its work place has also expanded from the local area to provinces, States, the whole country and even other countries. For example, several universities in Canada have opportunities to cooperate with the United States, Britain and Australia.

Cooperative system has simultaneous system and alternating system. Attend classes at the same time and work for half a day; The alternating system focuses on attending classes for one or several semesters, then working for a few months, then coming back to class, then working, and so on. Alternating system is more common. North American universities generally have two semesters, four in autumn and four in spring, with a two-week holiday from Christmas to New Year's Day and a summer vacation in May, June, July and August, which is equivalent to normal semesters. Most students work in summer vacation to earn money. If the family conditions are good, of course, wild ducks will be released. Some take summer vacation as the third semester, and there are fewer courses to choose from. The cooperative system also uses the summer vacation time to become a three-semester system. The number of classroom semesters is the same as that of ordinary college students, that is to say, the four-year system has eight classroom semesters, but there are also working semesters. Generally, the total time of working semesters is required to be between 16-24 months, and different schools and departments have different requirements.

There are many ways to alternate systems. For example, freshman is divided into two classes. Class A is only a freshman in the semester, and the next semester is a part-time semester. When I come back from the summer vacation, I will make up the next semester, and then I will work for four months, so I will alternate to the last year. Class B has been a freshman for one or two consecutive semesters, followed by a four-month part-time semester, and then alternated. The last semester of freshman and the next semester of senior are the only times when Class A and Class B merge. Under special circumstances, it is allowed to merge two working semesters into one working semester of eight months, and the next two classroom semesters are also back to back. After five years of study in this way, there are 24 months of working semesters, and there is no summer vacation, but the number of classroom semesters is the same as that of non-cooperative system. The advantage of this is that the work semester is evenly distributed, and all students are prevented from knocking at the door of various companies at the same time to find opportunities for work semester. Decentralized work semesters also provide more different opportunities to try different companies and work properties, and are also conducive to gradually combining what you have learned with practice. To be more extreme, if you find that your chosen major is not suitable for you in practice, you can make a decision to change your major ahead of time.

Another way is that there is only one working semester for freshmen and sophomores, an eight-month working semester between sophomores and juniors, and an eight-month working semester between juniors and seniors. In this way, you can finish your studies in four and a half years, and the cumulative working semester is 20 months. If the arrangement is a little looser, you can also insert a summer vacation in the middle to relax; Or add four months of work semester. Of course, it takes five years to finish school. The advantage of this is that the focus of the work semester is later, which is conducive to the systematic application of certain knowledge to practice after a long time, and also avoids the fragmentation of work experience.

What's more, in the first three years, only four months of work semester was arranged, but between junior and senior, a long work semester of 16 months was arranged at once. This is close to the usual probation, and the work experience is relatively complete. This is good and bad. If 16 months is fruitful, the following employment will naturally come. If there is a problem with running-in, it will be wasted.

In cooperative education, the working semester is as important as the classroom semester. Every working semester must consider working in a place that meets the requirements and be certified on the list. You can't just find a grocery store or a small workshop with seven aunts and eight aunts to work. At the end of the working semester, the other party must issue a certificate stating whether it meets the requirements before passing the semester. Universities have specialized institutions, and usually establish fixed cooperative relations with a considerable number of large, medium and small companies to help students implement the work semester, but they are not responsible for finding places, and ultimately students have to find them themselves. Finding a job is part of cooperative education. Here, famous universities not only have a bright future after graduation, but also are reflected in their job search during the working semester. Non-famous universities also have opportunities, because such "short-term informal employment" has a low threshold, no psychological burden, and it is easy to accept new faces. As long as you prove your strength, new faces will have the opportunity to become old brands. On the other hand, the employment records of industry leaders in the working semester are very useful for graduates to apply for jobs, and they are also conclusive evidence of university enrollment.

After working for half a year, the company gives subsidies, and some also give resettlement fees (including round-trip air tickets) according to the standards for recruiting new people. This is issued directly by the company to students, and there is no uniform standard. However, in order to attract outstanding students, large companies often offer subsidies close to the salaries of newly recruited entry-level engineers. This is not only enough food and clothing, but also usually enough to pay at least the same amount of classroom semester tuition and school living expenses. In other words, cooperative students can often complete their studies with little or no education loans, so they are very attractive to students with poor family economic conditions, which is much better than working in summer vacation. The attraction to students with better economic conditions mainly lies in their employment prospects. The working semester is equivalent to the probation period of the company. If you like, say hello early and report directly after graduation. If you don't like it, the semester will be over, and everyone will have no psychological burden. Of course, the choice is two-way. Excellent students experience different working environments in different working semesters, and it is common for them to be invited by employers in previous working semesters when they graduate.

In addition, going to college is a long journey for many people, but it is still a "safe harbor" within the high wall. The working semester is about to enter the society. You should not only travel again, but also learn to stand on your own feet. You can't chew it, and you don't have an iron friend to help you. Establishing one's own world in a different new environment is a characteristic of the cooperative system. Learning to grow up may also be the lack of education in China.

During my junior year in college, I didn't learn professional knowledge. At this time, the working semester is mainly a general secretarial task or a task that does not require professional knowledge. Many companies don't need such cheap labor, and four months is too short. It is rare for them to leave as soon as they know the southeast, northwest and northwest. Even if four months alternate, they may return to the same place and do it for the last time, saving running-in time. In the fourth year of college, I have taken all the basic professional courses, so I can do something. If the working period is long, I can do something.

What do cooperative college students do? Generally, it is a "technical apprentice". It's no wonder, after all, they are not regular employees, and they won't stay long, so they can't give projects that are too critical and too long-term. Moreover, I haven't graduated from the university, and I haven't attended advanced professional courses. The requirements can't be too high. Taking a chemical plant as an example, the typical work includes data collection and analysis, for example, the correlation analysis between the operation of a certain equipment in different products and different output periods in the past few years and the failure rate, and the organization of short, flat and fast technological transformation projects (finding people to meet, writing reports, running errands and auditing, etc.). ), daily operation reports, etc. Or graphic display modification of computer control system, or simple data or graphic processing programming. If conditions are good, it can be done for a complete but relatively simple control application. In short, it should be meaningful and not too picky. It's no secret, but I'm mainly afraid that if something goes wrong, there will be a big mistake. Students in the working semester do not require independence, or even are not allowed to be independent. They are all led and guided by special personnel, usually middle and senior engineers in the company. Everything should be rechecked to make sure it is correct. After all, this is an educational process, not child labor. In addition to doing it yourself, most of the students who have on-the-job engineers participate in technical, business, administrative meetings and collective discussions to learn about the daily work of engineers. Sometimes people in the post can't attend the meeting because of their own affairs, and may even send students to attend the meeting on their behalf.

During the working semester, students will come into contact with things they have not learned in the course or things outside the course. Due to the limitation of time and conditions, it may not be fully understood. However, I have walked too much by the river, at least I have seen how the river flows without wet shoes, and I have heard too much. Practical problems and engineering methods are always impressive. When I plant seeds, when I go back to the classroom, I can often relate the classroom content to the actual situation I see, so learning is easier and more purposeful and effective. On the other hand, what you learn in class is actually for this purpose and is also a way to strengthen the learning effect. To take a step back, students have a first-hand understanding of their future careers in different working semesters, which is helpful to strengthen their career direction or change their direction as soon as possible.

It should be pointed out that the cooperative system is only used for undergraduate education, and there is no cooperative education for graduate students. This is determined by the essential difference between graduate education and undergraduate education. Undergraduate education is essentially mass production, and the working semester provides a certain personalized component. Postgraduate education is essentially a tutorial system, and there is no one-size-fits-all model. How to teach graduate students has much to do with the professor's personality and methods. Professors can send graduate students to the website to do research or other work, or they can not. This is entirely a matter between professors and graduate students, which is generally ignored by universities and has nothing to do with the overall organization of cooperative education. In addition, professors do not participate in the work semester part of cooperative education, so the relationship between professors and industries has nothing to do with cooperative system, which has no special effect on the transformation of professors' scientific and technological achievements.

For companies, cooperative system is not only the pre-selection of recruitment, but also can affect the engineering education of universities through direct interaction with universities or indirect interaction with students. For colleges and universities, cooperative system not only reserves jobs for students, but also is an important means to make up for the growing disconnect between engineering education and engineering practice. Another function is that professional ability is more in line with the job market. If the working semester can't be solved, it is even more problematic whether the job market can accommodate so many graduates. Students don't have to wait until graduation to be surprised. On the other hand, as mentioned above, the short-term but zero-distance nature of the part-time job semester determines that the entry threshold is low, which is conducive to the establishment of influence and prestige of universities and majors with strength but lack of prestige, and is also conducive to screening pseudo-famous universities with more name than strength.

For middle and senior engineers with jobs, students in the working semester can help with odd jobs and errands, and they can also help with a lot of trivial but simple and repetitive work, but it undoubtedly brings more daily guidance burden. The daily workload will not be reduced because of taking students. This extra work has no allowance and belongs to voluntary labor. Of course, the company supports cooperative system. In the personal year-end assessment, leading students can be regarded as leadership and preaching. If you do well, you may get a little bonus at the end of the year, but that's all. Usually, it is mainly due to the public morality of occupation and talent training. Many people also had the experience of working semester, and now it's time to give back to the society.

Of course, the cooperative system is not perfect. For students, it takes at least four and a half to five years to complete their studies, and it is also very hard for others to sleep late and eat the old people happily. In addition, the cooperative system is not without influence on classroom learning, especially the short interval system with four-month alternation. Classroom learning is easy to be fragmented and incoherent. What I just seemed to understand was soaked in the factory for four months, and then I forgot it. This is also the reason why longer class semesters and working semesters are more popular. In addition, for students who are determined to pursue graduate studies, they may focus on theoretical research in the future, and the work experience in the working semester may not be useful, which also prolongs the university time.

For universities, the cooperative system disrupts the normal and regular semester rotation, and each student may have the problem of formulating courses separately. Universities should ensure that compulsory courses can be covered in all classroom semesters, and it is not easy to arrange them centrally. There will also be cases where students of different grades sit in the same classroom, but students of the same year sit in different classrooms, and the workload of student management is much larger. In addition, some cooperative semester arrangements need to arrange courses during the summer vacation, which further disrupts the school cycle. Cooperative system has added a lot of workload to universities, which can only be completed with the strong support of universities. However, the cooperative system is very effective and especially welcomed by the industry. In North America, for engineering graduates, many large companies generally do not recruit non-cooperative university graduates unless their studies are particularly excellent.

For China, engineering education has been divorced from practice, and the emergence of a large number of colleges and universities has further increased the pressure on teachers. The cooperative system not only makes up for the problem that school theory is out of touch with practice, but also is an opportunity for employment and recruitment reform, which is worth thinking about.

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