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So that graduate students can really learn and succeed, and can reflect full competitiveness in future job search and scientific research.
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Lanzhou University. Visual China data map
Text丨 Zhang Shiwei
Lanzhou University recently announced that in 2024, the total number of graduate students will exceed the total number of undergraduate students for the first time. In recent years, the enrollment scale of graduate students at Lanzhou University has increased year by year, and in 2019, the annual enrollment of graduate students has exceeded that of undergraduate students.
This news has aroused considerable attention on the Internet: there are actually more graduate students than undergraduates, isn't this "upside down"? From the perspective of common sense, the higher the level of higher education, the number of people should decrease, but now it is the opposite, which also makes many people curious.
People can't simply understand that there are more graduate students than undergraduates. Nationally, undergraduate enrollment is still the majority. According to the basic situation of the development of national education in 2023 released by the Ministry of Education, there will be 4,781,600 regular undergraduate students and 1,301,700 graduate students. In fact, this kind of "inversion" only exists in some research universities.
In recent years, research universities have generally experienced rapid growth in the number of graduate students. In addition to Lanzhou University, according to media reports, Tongji University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Sun Yat-sen University, Nanjing University, etc., have all seen the phenomenon of "upside down" of bachelor's and master's degrees. It can also be seen from this batch of lists that most of these schools are famous schools and recognized research universities, and there are more master's and doctoral programs, so it is naturally possible to recruit more graduate students.
Encouraging schools to develop into research universities is itself the direction of current education reform. Not long ago, the Office of the Academic Degrees Committee of the State Council issued the "Announcement of the Verification and Evaluation Results of the Expert Verification and Evaluation of the Authorization of New Doctoral and Master's Degrees", adding 831 doctoral degree authorization points and 1,924 master's degree authorization points across the country, with a total of 2,755 new ones.
Objectively speaking, encouraging more schools to recruit more graduate students will help improve the quality and level of running schools, and also expand the possibility of everyone receiving higher education, which is of positive significance for improving the overall quality of the population and the quality of education.
It should be noted that there is no shortage of worried voices on the Internet - can the quality of education be guaranteed with the rapid expansion of graduate students? Can teachers, hardware and other supporting facilities keep up? These concerns are not entirely unnecessary, and if too much emphasis is placed on quantity and neglect quality, leading to a disconnect between postgraduate training and social needs, and a "depreciation" of academic qualifications, it may cause a series of problems.
Therefore, the number of undergraduates and postgraduates is not a problem in itself, the key is to continuously improve the quality of education, so that graduate students can really learn and succeed, and can reflect full competitiveness in future job search and scientific research.
At present, there are many policies aimed at improving the quality of postgraduate training. Not long ago, the media reported that the extension of the duration of postgraduate studies has become a trend, especially for professional masters, many of which have been extended from 2 years to 3 years. One of the important goals is to improve the quality of education so that students can acquire more solid knowledge and application skills.
In addition, many places have also begun to strengthen the assessment of graduate students. For example, Beijing announced in 2021 that it would increase the sampling of master's theses in the next three years to achieve full coverage of student groups such as professional degrees, part-time, equivalent academic ability, and international students, with the same focus on improving the overall quality of graduate education.
Therefore, the situation of "upside down" of bachelor's and master's degrees in some schools is normal from the trend of the development of higher education itself. However, in the process, it is also necessary to strengthen the checks and assessments, so that graduate education can show sufficient gold content, be widely recognized by the society, and truly realize the original intention of improving the overall cultural quality and academic level of the whole people.
Editor|Li Qinyu
Typesetting|Gan Qiongfang
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