On April 7, 2017, the School of Innovation and Entrepreneurship of Minjiang University (hereinafter referred to as the “School”) was established as a pilot area for comprehensive reform of undergraduate talent training in Fujian Province. Minjiang University is in the first batch of demonstration colleges and universities for deepening reform of innovation and entrepreneurship education in Fujian Province and a demonstration site for the Demonstration Base of Innovation and Entrepreneurship in the Fuzhou New Area. The School consists of 3 departments (Comprehensive Practice Section, Entrepreneurship Education Section, and Innovation and Entrepreneurship Research Center) and 2 teaching and research offices (Office of Career Planning and Employment Guidance for College Students and Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship Education). The teaching team is composed of masters and doctors engaged in general courses, including 4 full-time teachers (2 doctors and 1 doctoral candidate), 27 part-time teachers, 6 associate professors, and 26 lecturers. The School has also hired many full-time and part-time instructors, including 51 entrepreneurs, 41 teachers of KAB and SIYB projects, and 62 teachers of TTT career planning and employment guidance.
Following the idea of “gathering resources for comprehensive reform” in general and the standard for a state-level model university of reform in innovation and entrepreneurship, the School aims to evolve into a provincial model institution of education in innovation, entrepreneurship and creation and a provincial demonstration base of educational practice for industry-innovation integration. Taking “stick to the path of application-oriented education and strive to train more high-quality technical talents” as the priority, the School proactively upgrades the innovation, entrepreneurship and creation education, and further promotes the combination of innovation & entrepreneurship education and professional education, striving to build a educational system of innovation, entrepreneurship and creation featuring the integrated development of “thinking, profession, science, technology, industry” and synergy of “serve industry, integrate into the profession, penetrate the study, lead entrepreneurship, and stimulate employment”.
The construction of the first pilot institution of “second classroom transcript” reform in Fujian province is a good opportunity for the School to quantify the standard to assess the students’ ability to innovate and start up their own businesses, and explore the pilot work of the “degree certificate + several vocational skill level certificates” system; establish a hierarchical and progressive innovation & entrepreneurship curriculum system of “general courses - curriculum group of innovation & entrepreneurship education - characteristic course series of innovation & entrepreneurship”; build an incubator chain of innovation, entrepreneurship and creation education with the integration of “nursery - incubator - accelerator, promote the industry-university-research-application collaborative innovation, and vigorously carry out practical training of innovation, entrepreneurship and creation education, so as to form a vivid picture featuring co-creation by teachers and students and industry-innovation integration.
The School has achieved fruitful achievements in innovation, entrepreneurship and creation education since its inception. To be specific, it has established three industrial colleges, namely Zhidao International Lacquer Arts College, Fenghuang Digital Media College, and Baidu Big Data Innovation College, joined hands with Fujian Branch of PICC to set up “Puhui Finance School”, and offered innovation classes and experimental classes such as the innovation & entrepreneurship elite class, “innovation, entrepreneurship and creation” seed class, cross-border e-commerce training class. Over the past three decades, the School has been involved in a large number of new projects, including 30 industry-university collaborative education projects under the Ministry of Education, 5 provincial reform projects of innovation and entrepreneurship education; 72 national-level, 137 provincial-level and 390 university-level innovation & entrepreneurship training projects for college students; more than 1,300 award-winning projects of discipline competitions for college students at or above the provincial level. The awards received include 2 silver awards and 3 bronze awards at the national level and 2 gold awards, 6 silver awards and 15 bronze awards at the provincial level of the “Internet+” College Students Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition; 1 second prize at the national level, and 1 grand prize, 3 first prizes, 3 second prizes and 8 third prizes at the provincial level of the “Challenge Cup” National College Students’ Extracurricular Academic Science and Technology Contest; 1 gold award and 1 bronze award at the national level, and 4 gold awards, 3 silver awards and 7 bronze awards at the provincial level of the China College Students’ Entrepreneurship Competition.
The School of Innovation and Entrepreneurship will fully grasp and put into practice the principles from General Secretary Xi Jinping’s major addresses on education, make consistent efforts to deepen the reform of innovation, entrepreneurship and creation education, and proactively promote closer combination of innovation, entrepreneurship and creation education and professional education, thus fostering more high-quality technical talents.
