Abstract
Globally, graduate education has been an integral part of national strategic planning, drawing heavy investment, favorable policy, and intense financial support from both the national and state government and active support from social organizations. In China, since the restoration of graduate education in 1978, Chinese graduate education has gone through arduous explorations and continual improvement. This chapter aims to provide an overall understanding of Chinese graduate education by reviewing its brief history, its development in quantity and quality as compared to other existing graduate education systems over the past decade, and the evolution of national policies and best practices concerning graduate education.
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1 Introduction
The development of graduate-level (including both doctoral and master level) talents is commonly regarded as the pinnacle of the educational spectrum. Sustainable development and continual improvement of graduate education for a nation greatly contributes to the cultivation of highly skilled researchers and workforce, which in turn leads to flourishing of scientific discoveries, technological innovations, and the national economy at large. Therefore, establishing a strong graduate educational system became a strategic part of national educational policies.
Research studies over the past four decades on global graduate education systems have indicated the competitive edge of graduate education of the U.S., the U.K., and other developed countries in terms of the capacity of scientific research, and the quality of teaching and learning, which have continually attracted foreign students to pursue graduate degrees in these countries (Altbach, 2004a; Nerad, 2010). Nevertheless, recent rankings of global graduate schools have witnessed a strong surge of graduate schools from other countries and regions, in particular those from Asian countries such as China, Singapore and Malaysia, over the past two decades (Lee et al., 2020; University World News, 2022). Favorable national policies, heavy investment in Research and Development (R&D), a strong focus on STEM disciplines, and diaspora have all contributed to the development of graduate education in the emerging competitive graduate education systems including China (Altbach et al., 2012; Cheng & Liu, 2006; Lee et al., 2020).
In the case of China, exploring graduate education policies and practices has been in the agenda of Chinese government since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. However, the piloting practice of graduate education in the 1950s, although being important and helpful explorations, was confined to a small-scale trial with limited educational quality (Zhao, 1999). An early version of the official national graduate degree policy was written in 1964; although, it was not fully executed due to various reasons. Since the restoration of graduate education in 1978, it has gone through arduous trials and continual improvement (Wang & Yang, 2019; Zhao, 2001). The growth of Chinese graduate education has kept pace with the development of the nation by aligning with national strategic planning, serving the economic and social needs, and cultivating high-level talent (Wang et al., 2019). Through both learning the best practices from other leading countries and active innovation and fine-tuning of the educational system to meet domestic and local needs, Chinese graduate education has created and established a comprehensive system that embodies unique Chinese characteristics, growing in both quantity and quality (Wang, 2019; Wang & Zhang, 2019).
After the issuing of the Notice on Recruiting Graduate Students in Higher Education Institutions in 1977, 10,000 graduate students were recruited and enrolled in 1978 (Wang & Yang, 2019). The document of Degree Regulations of the People’s Republic of China was issued in 1980 along with additional policies for implementation, signifying the official establishment of Chinese graduate degree system (National People’s Congress, 2004). The first group of 18 doctoral degree recipients were awarded and celebrated in 1983 (Chen, 2013).
With the official establishment of the Chinese postgraduate degree system, multiple reformatory policies and measures were launched. These policies included founding graduate schools within higher education institutions, issuing and adjusting the list of disciplines for awarding graduate degrees, organizing different levels of graduate degree committees and other administrative measures. Through these efforts, the Chinese graduate degree system has been continually developing and optimizing itself.
After the 1990s, Chinese graduate education has entered a stage of rapid development, which took place together with the fast economic growth and technological progress of the Chinese society. Due to the favorable national policy issued in 1999 expanding the recruitment of higher education (Ministry of Education [MOE], 1999), the average annual growth of graduate degrees awarded had remained higher than 25% between 1999 and 2007 (National Bureau of Statistics, 2008). The average annual growth of doctoral degrees was 19.7% and that of master’s degrees was 27.4%.
The establishment of a series of national-level graduate educational policies on various aspects of graduate education have set the foundation for such development. National policies covered aspects of graduate education such as educational quality assurance, the creation of professional graduate degrees, and the assessment and evaluation of degree-granting programs. In addition to national-level guiding policies, the active experimentation of pioneering institutes and universities, such as Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) and Tsinghua University (THU), have also explored suitable graduate education practices adapted to the social and economic needs of China. Moreover, practitioners and scholars have been actively exploring the teaching, learning and administration of graduate education, and analyzing and summarizing the challenges and opportunities in practice, which also contribute to the proliferation of Chinese graduate education.
It should be noted that national policies that were geared towards higher education in general, although not targeting graduate education in specific, have also greatly facilitated the fast development of Chinese graduate education. In particular, national policies such as Project 211 (1995) and Project 985 (1998), along with the subsequent Double World-Class Project (2015), were critical initiatives launched by the Chinese government to enhance the academic and research quality of key Chinese universities with the goal of becoming world-class universities (MOE, 2008; the State Council, 2015). The projects supported the development of universities by allocating sufficient funds, issuing preferential policies and the support of other resources (MOE, 2008; MOE et al., 2017). In addition to the policies promoting the overall development of higher education, special policies and measures targeting graduate education have also played an important role. Through this process, Chinese graduate education has benefited tremendously from such targeted support and flourished over the past twenty years. The scale and quality of Chinese graduate education have experienced an unprecedented increase which will be delineated in-depth in this chapter.
In this chapter, through an overview of data on the development of Chinese graduate education placed in comparison to the current leading graduate education systems, this chapter attempts to offer an overall understanding of the recent trends in the development of Chinese graduate education. Using a set of excellence indicators, this chapter situates the Chinese graduate education system in the context of global comparison with the existing advanced graduate education systems. In addition to an overall and comparative look of the system, this chapter further zooms into the Chinese graduate education system by highlighting the unique features, introducing the best practices, and providing in-depth stories about the development of selective universities or graduate schools to showcase the developmental processes. Moreover, a synthesis of current literature of the past 10 years offers an understanding of the recent trends on key research findings concerning graduate education among mandarin literature. Finally, the evolution of Chinese national policies related to graduate education is described to illustrate the various aspects of supports that have been provided by the national government.
2 Highlighting Data
2.1 Number of Graduate Degrees Awarded
The number of graduate degrees awarded by Chinese institutions in 2021 was 772,800, an increase from 767,984 in 2020, according to the data provided by Chinese MOE. Among them, around 90.68% of students were awarded master’s degrees, and 9.32% were doctorate recipients (MOE, 2020a, 2022).
Figures 1 and 2 depict the growth curves for doctoral degrees and master’s degrees awarded in China from 2010 to 2021. Figure 3 shows the growth curve for total graduate degrees awarded from 2010 to 2021. As shown in Fig. 3, the overall number of graduate degree holders doubled compared to that of 2010. More specifically, the number of doctoral degree recipients climbed from 47,407 in 2010 to 72,000 in 2021, and the number of master’s degree recipients rose from 332,585 to 700,700.
From 2010 to 2021, the average annual growth rate for the number of graduate degree holders is about 7.36%; the average annual growth rate for the number of doctoral degree holders is about 4.27%; the average annual growth rate for the number of master’s degree holders is about 7.74%. The growth rate of master’s degrees has been much faster than that of doctoral degrees.
Figure 4 depicts the number of graduate degree holders in ten different countries in 2019. Compared to leading countries in graduate education, including the U.S., the U.K., Japan, Germany, Australia, Canada, France, the Netherlands, and the Republic of Korea (ROK), China is now the second-largest country in terms of the number of master’s and/or doctoral degrees awarded every year. These numbers were preceded only by the U.S. with 953,814 students awarded master’s degrees and 73,923 doctoral degrees in 2019.
2.2 Total Enrollment of Graduate Students
In terms of the number of graduate students enrolled in China in 2021, there were 1,050,700 students admitted to master’s programs, and 125,800 to doctoral programs. The total enrollment number has reached over one million (1,176,500) in 2021 in China (MOE, 2022). From 2010 to 2021, the average annual growth rate of the number of enrolled graduate students is about 8.14%, the average annual growth rate of enrollment number at the master’s level about 8.28% and the average annual growth rate of enrollment number at the doctoral level about 7.03%.
Figures 5 and 6 show the growth curves of the enrollment of doctoral-level and master-level students from 2010 to 2021. Figure 7 shows the growth curve of the total enrollment of graduate students from 2010 to 2021.
Compared to the enrollment of graduate students in the leading countries in graduate education, China ranked fourth, following the US, Germany, and France (Fig. 8). As China ranked second for the number of graduate degrees awarded, this may represent higher completion rates for master’s and doctoral degrees in China.
2.3 Ratio of Doctoral Degrees to the Total Graduate Degrees
Compared to other countries, China has a relatively lower percentage of doctoral degrees awarded, which was about 8.53% in 2019 (see Fig. 9). The top three countries that have the highest percentages of doctoral degrees among all graduate degrees are ROK (15.84%), Japan (13.05%) and Germany (11.41%).
2.4 Workforce (25–64 Year-Olds) with Graduate Education Attainment
As shown in the prior data, the scale of graduate education is rapidly increasing in China. However, the ratio of population among the labor force (e.g., 25–64 year-olds) that has graduate degree attainment is relatively low. According to the “General Census” conducted in 2020, only around 1.11% of the population in China aged 25 – 64 hold master’s degrees or doctoral degrees (see Fig. 10). In comparison, the OECD average of 25–64 year-olds population that hold master’s degrees or doctoral degrees were approximately 13.5% and 1.3% respectively in 2020 (OECD, 2021a).
Source National Bureau of Statistics (2021)
Educational attainment of 25–64 year-olds in China in 2020.
The percentage of graduate education attained in China is the lowest among the listed countries (see Fig. 11). The top three countries that have a labor force with the highest ratio of graduate education attainment were the Netherlands, the U.K., and the U.S. Despite the expansion in the scale of Chinese graduate education, the graduate education attainment among Chinese labor force is yet to be increased. In this sense, this chapter might expect a further increase in the scale of Chinese graduate education in the near future.
2.5 Student-Faculty Ratio
The student-faculty ratio is considered to be a proxy of quality in graduate education, as students are more likely to receive greater support and attention when the ratio is low. In China, with the restoration of graduate education since 1978, the number of graduate supervisors is also on the rise (Fig. 12), with an average annual growth rate of 7.24% between 2010 and 2020. Meanwhile, the total number of graduate students at school has been increasing between 2010 and 2020 (Fig. 13) with an average annual growth rate of 7.39%.
With comparable annual growth rates for both in-school graduate students and supervisors, the graduate student-supervisor ratio remained approximately 6:1 between 2010 and 2020 (Fig. 14). In 2010, the ratio was 6.41:1. From 2010 to 2020, the overall ratio saw a slight decrease, with the lowest number (5.45:1) in 2016, which was followed by another increase. In 2020, the ratio of graduate students to supervisors was around 6.5:1, with 482,838 supervisors and 3,139,598 graduate students at school.
When compared to the data from OECD, the student-faculty ratio of Chinese higher education is close to other leading higher education countries. It should be noted that the faculty number here refers to faculty members at bachelor, master, and doctoral levels, instead of just graduate supervisors. As shown in Fig. 15, the top three countries with the highest student-faculty ratio are France, China, and Australia.
2.6 Number of International Students in Graduate Education
The ability to attract international students has been an important indicator for the quality of graduate education. China has become one of the most popular study destinations globally. According to The Open Doors Report 2019 (Institute of International Education, 2019), China, still being one of the largest home countries to send students abroad, has now become the third largest host country for international students (the top two being the U.S. and U.K.). In 2018, there were 492,185 foreign students studying in China, with 258,122 of them pursuing a degree (more than 50%) (MOE, 2019b). When compared with 2017, the number of students studying for a graduate degree increased by 12.28% and reached 85,062. Among them, 59,444 students were studying for a master’s degree, and 25,618 were studying for a doctoral degree (MOE, 2019b). The last decade has witnessed a rapid increase in the enrollment of international graduate students, which increased from 18,978 in 2009 to 85,065 in 2018 (MOE, 2019b). The average annual growth rate is approximately 20.59%. See Fig. 16 for more detailed information.
Source MOE (1994–2019)
Number of international graduate students enrolled (1994–2018).
Since the initial attempt of international student enrollment in 1954, the number of international students studying for a graduate degree in China has grown steadily (Chen, 2008). However, the exact data were not clearly documented until 1986, when 26 international students came to China for graduate studies according to the record. The data soared to 53 and 104 in the following two years. As can be seen clearly in Fig. 16, there was an exponential growth trend in the number of international students between 1994 to 2018—nternational graduate students increased steadily before 2010 and soared afterwards. This was mainly due to the Study in China Plan published by MOE in September 2010 (MOE, 2010a). The goal of this plan was to increase the number of international students coming to China and to promote the sustainable and healthy development of international student outreach.
Despite the fast pace of the international graduate education expansion, due to the large graduate student population in China, international graduate students only represent a small proportion, around 10% for Double World-Class universities.
Regarding the ethnicities of international students enrolled in Chinese higher education (including all types of students in higher education institutions at both undergraduate and graduate levels), Asian students constituted the largest group, probably due to the cultural similarities and proximity of the countries. As shown on MOE’s website, ROK, Thailand, and Pakistan sent the most students (50,600, 28,608, and 28,023 respectively). In terms of financial support, 12.81% of the students were funded by the Chinese government, whereas 87.19% were self-supported or financed by other resources (MOE, 2019b).
2.7 Research and Development (R&D) Funding in Higher Education
In 2019, the Chinese government supported a broad range of scientific and engineering R&D activities, with total funding of RMB2,214.36 billion (approximately US$346 billion) in all sections (National Bureau of Statistics, 2020). Among the 2,214.36 billion, RMB179.66 billion was invested in higher education, an increase of 23.2% above the 2018 level of 145.79 billion (about US$22,779 million) (National Bureau of Statistics, 2020). China ranked third for the R&D funding of higher education among the 10 countries previously mentioned (see Fig. 17). The R&D investment of higher education in China is about one-third of the funding level in the U.S. (US$60,535 million).
2.8 The Volume of Academic Research Publications
Producing high quality research publications has been an important indicator for the quality of academic research in graduate education. Among the common indexing for research journals, SSCI and SCIE that were developed by Clarivate have been widely used as a measure for citations of research journals. According to the data from Web of Science (WOS), the total number of research articles that were published in Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) and Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE) by Chinese scholars in 2021 ranked top among the listed countries (see Fig. 18). Meanwhile, the number of research articles that were published in SSCI and SCIE by Chinese scholars have been increasing over the past decade (see Fig. 19).
Source WOS (n.d.)
The number of research publications by scholars from different countries (2021).
Source WOS (n.d.)
The number of research publications by scholars of China (2010–2021).
In summary, highlighting data in this section were used to showcase the recent development Chinese graduate education. In a sense, the panel data and the trends of key developmental data of Chinese graduate education over the past decade that were illustrated here point to the increase of both quantity and quality of Chinese graduate education, in particular through a comparison to the data from the current leading graduate education systems.
3 Excellence Indicators
3.1 Design
To provide a comparative understanding of the Chinese graduate education system, this chapter designs a set of graduate education excellence indicators to capture the development of graduate education systems of several benchmarking countries in selective dimensions. In specific, the excellence indicators are designed to capture the capacity of a certain nation to provide high quality graduate education.
The design of the excellence indicators follows three principles—comparability, accessibility, and representativeness. In terms of comparability, chosen indicators should showcase some feature or characteristic of graduate education systems which can be compared with that of other existing graduate educational systems. To satisfy the principle of accessibility, the source data of a chosen indicator for a particular graduate educational system should be readily available or can be obtained via simple calculations from public websites or databases. In terms of representativeness, it is expected that the chosen indicators can reflect some feature of a particular dimension (e.g., performance or scale) before being counted as an indicator for that dimension.
After a careful search of available databases both globally and locally for graduate educational systems in different nation states, along with a synthesis of existing comparative studies of graduate educational systems across countries (Liu & Wang, 2012; Wang, 2015; Wang & Li, 2012; Zhao & Wang, 2013, 2015), the excellence indicators are finalized with ten indicators from three dimensions. More specifically, the design of excellence indicators covers the performance, scale, and resource dimensions of a graduate educational system for a particular country or region. The detailed definitions and source data for each indicator within the three dimensions are covered below.
3.2 Definitions and Sources
Overall, there are ten specific indicators in three different dimensions (Performance, Scale, and Resource) (Table 1). The specific indicators and the respective data sources are listed according to their dimensions.
In the performance dimension, specific indicators include, the ratio of doctoral degrees to the total graduate degrees, the annual growth rate of enrollment of graduate students over the past five years, attainment of graduate education among 25–34 year-olds (defined as the ratio of 25–34 year-olds with graduate degrees), the number of journal publications that were indexed in the SCIE or SSCI, the ratio of international graduate students (defined as the average of the ratio of master-level international students and the ratio of doctoral-level international students), and the ratio of people possessing graduate degrees among the workforce (defined as the total percentage of people with graduate degrees among 25–64 year-olds). In the scale dimension, a specific indicator includes the number of graduate degrees granted. In the resource dimension, indicators include student-faculty ratio, R&D funds (defined as expenditures in R&D activities in tertiary education), the ratio of institutions/universities that ranked in the top 50 versus the total number of institutions and universities in a country (operationally defined as the ratio of institutions and universities that ranked in the top 50 versus the total number of institutions and universities that entered the ARWU in 2021 in a particular country (ShanghaiRanking, 2021).
It should be noted that all data are obtained first as raw data in its original units. Such data are then normalized to a 0–100 scale, representing the highest score as 100. Also, since the source data for two indicators – the annual growth rate of enrollment of graduate students over the past five years and the ratio of international students—tend to be clustered at a certain range, it is reasonable to classify them into data ranges rather than normalizing the source data. In this case, the source data that is in the highest level is counted as 100.
3.3 Findings
Together, this chapter compares ten countries’ graduate education using the excellence indicators. These ten countries are selected based on an understanding of current existing literature about the general development of graduate education of different countries (Altbach, 2004b; Nerad, 2010). The 10 countries include, the U.S., the U.K., Germany, France, the Netherlands, Australia, Canada, Japan, ROK, and China. Via the calculation of respective indicators in each dimension, scores of the excellence indicators were obtained for the listed ten countries (Table 2). Through a comparison of the scores, the ten countries were sorted according to their respective average scores. A sorted list of the ten countries is presented in Fig. 19 using their average scores.
Through an overall comparison across the ten countries, as shown in Fig. 20, the U.S. with a score of 74.74, is ranked in the top position. France and the U.K. rank in the second and the third places respectively. Several European countries follow the top three ranks. China, with a score of 48.24, is ranked in the sixth position of the list followed by Japan, Australia, Canada, and ROK.
A sorted list of the ten countries using their respective average scores of the graduate education excellence indicators
As shown in Table 2, Chinese graduate education system has shown its competitiveness by leading in several indicators. First, China ranks at the top of the list in two indicators: the annual growth rate of enrollment of graduate students over the past five years and the number of journal publications that were indexed in the SCIE or SSCI. Meanwhile, Chinese graduate education system ranks second for the student-faculty ratio, behind France. Also, the difference between the scores (100 vs. 95) indicates a close gap between the actual number of faculty-student ratios of the two graduate education systems. In addition, China also ranks second for the number of graduate degrees granted, behind the U.S. Considering the difference between the scores (100 vs. 76), the number of graduate degrees granted in Chinese graduate education system was only about 3/4 of the number of the U.S. system. Moreover, following the U.S. and Germany, China ranks at the top 3 for the R&D fund. Comparing the differences between the scores (100 for the U.S., 41 for Germany and 38 for China), it can be concluded that the U.S. continues to lead in its investment for R&D fund in higher education.
On the contrary, there are also several indicators in which Chinese graduate education system ranked poorly, including the attainment of graduate education among 25–34 year-olds, the ratio of international graduate students, the ratio of people possessing graduate degrees among the workforce, and the ratio of institutions/universities that ranked in the top 50 versus the total number of institutions/universities in a country. In all four indicators, China ranks at the bottom of the list.
Finally, for the ratio of doctoral degrees to total graduate degrees, China, along with countries like the U.S., the U.K, rank in the middle of the list. ROK and Japan rank as the top two countries in this indicator, suggesting greater emphasis on doctoral education despite of the small scale of the two systems.
3.4 Discussions
In summary, using the graduate education excellence indicators provides a comparative view of the graduate education systems of different countries. Based on the comparison of the various indicators, it is noticeable that through the development of graduate education over the past forty decades, Chinese graduate education has seen a dramatic increase in both its quantity and quality.
First, Chinese graduate educational system excels in two indictors: the annual growth rate of enrollment of graduate students over the past five years and the number of journal publications that were indexed in the SCIE or SSCI. Concerning the annual growth rate of enrollment of graduate students over the past five years. Such a rapid growth rate is closely related to China’ national educational policies to increase the overall scale of higher education. The policy to expand the enrollment of both undergraduate and graduate level students began in 1999 (MOE, 1999a, b, c). The purpose of this policy is to increase the pool of high-quality talent and relieve the pressure of employment on young people (Li & Chen, 2006). This policy has been regarded widely as one of the most popular policies of the year due to the increased opportunities for more students to access higher education (Wang et al., 2019). The fast growth of graduate enrollment is tightly connected to the relatively high number of graduate degrees granted, in which China ranks in the top two as compared to other existing graduate education systems, second only to the U.S.
Concerning the leading position of China in the number of journal publications that were indexed in the SCIE or SSCI, prior studies have pointed out that such a growth in research output has benefited from the overall Chinese economic growth and Chinese government’s national policies to promote investment to science and technology to support the economic growth continually (Xie et al., 2014; Yang & Welch, 2012). Moreover, the fact that China is now producing more scientists and engineers at both the undergraduate and graduate levels has facilitated the increase of research output. Meanwhile, multiple programs have been launched to attract established Chinese scholars in science and engineering internationally (MOE, 2010b). Such programs have attracted a legion of Chinese talents overseas to join the academic research of science and technology in Chinese universities and institutes (Li et al., 2015). The increasing returnees in academia and the increasing local science and engineering degree holders have together contributed to the fast research output of Chinese higher education (Huang, 2003; Yang & Welch, 2010).
Despite China’s leading position in the growth rate of graduate enrollment and the overall number of graduate degrees conferred, China lags behind in the attainment of graduate education among 25–34 year-olds and the ratio of people possessing graduate degrees among the workforce, ranking at the bottom of the listed ten countries. The overall large quantities of graduate degree holders, divided by the large population, lead to relatively low number of degree holders among the general population. With China’s increasing need for economic development and a high-quality workforce, it can be expected that the increase of graduate enrollment and the overall number of graduate degrees conferred will be sustained in the Chinese graduate education system in the near future.
Although the total number of Chinese institutions/universities has been steadily increasing in the competitive rankings, the ratio of institutions/universities ranked in the top 50 versus the total number of institutions/universities (for example, in the ARWU) has been quite low for China, lagging far behind all of the listed countries. Seven universities in China entered the top 50, compared to 20 in the U.S. in 2021, according to the ARWU. On the other hand, China has quite a large number of institutions that entered the top 1,000 group. A total number of 157 universities are in the top 1000, while the U.S. has 200 universities listed in the top 1,000. As mentioned before, multiple strong national policies have supported the development of key universities in China, such as Project 211 and Project 985, and the latest Double World-Class policies. With continual favorable national policies, along with multiple other factors that shall be discussed in the later sections, one would expect the ratio of Chinese institutions/universities that ranked in the top 50 versus the total number of institutions/universities to continue to improve in the near future.
The attractiveness to international students has been one of the key indicators for the competitiveness of graduate educational systems (Wen et al., 2014). However, it appeared in the data that for the Chinese graduate educational system, the ratio of international graduate students remained far behind all of the other listed graduate educational systems. It should also be noted that, according to the data reported by the Institute of International Education, China has risen as the third largest destination for international students, including the graduate-level international students. To some degree, the increase in the number of international students has implied a rising competitiveness of China as an attractive destination for pursuing graduate degree. Reasons such as stable political environment, favorable scholarship policies, fast economic development, and quality research facilities and platforms, have all contributed to international graduate students’ decision for choosing Chinese universities (Zhang & Zhu, 2020). In addition, Chinese universities have been steadily improving in the rankings of graduate schools, especially in disciplines in science and engineering. Therefore, although the ratio of international students is still behind the ratio in other existing systems, such as about 25% in the U.S. and 40% in the U.K. (OECD, 2019d) at the doctoral level, it can be expected that more international students will choose Chinese graduate educational system in future.
4 Best Practices
With four decades’ experiences in graduate education after the restoration of graduate education in 1978, China has gradually developed a system of graduate education that embodies some unique features while learning from the best practices of existing systems in other countries. The Chinese graduate educational system has demonstrated its unique features in a number of policy measures and related practices. These policies and practices in graduate education include the establishment of a systematic quality assurance structure along with various quality assurance measures, innovations in the recruiting procedures, and autonomy in establishing graduate degree programs for selected universities and the dynamic adjustment of graduate degree programs.
4.1 Building a Systematic Quality Assurance System
The idea of establishing a systematic quality assurance structure was formally proposed in a governmental document – Guidelines on Strengthening the Degree and Graduate Education Quality Assurance and Monitoring System (The Degrees Committee of the State Council & MOE, 2014a). This governmental document officially put forward a “five-entity one-structure” quality assurance system that consists of five major entities in graduate education. These key entities include degree-granting institutions, educational administrative departments, academic organizations, industrial organizations, and other social organizations. Within this structure, the degree-granting institutions play a fundamental role in ensuring the quality of education while the educational administrative departments guide the general direction. Meanwhile, academic organizations, industrial organizations, and other social organizations actively engage in the quality monitoring process.
The policy document sets its focus on the quality of graduate education. The key policies aim at switching the roles and functions of the government and allowing more autonomy and power for the degree-granting institutions. To do so, it emphasizes the separation of the different roles of administration, implementation, and assessment of graduate education, highlighting the autonomous and central roles of degree-granting institutions. The policy requires degree-granting institutions to take a more proactive role in accountability by establishing internal quality assurance systems, drafting quality standards for graduate education according to the institutions’ goals, and building a sound mechanism for resource allocations (e.g., graduate assistantships) that centered on improving educational quality.
Such empowerment further extends within degree-granting institutions by putting the responsibility of quality assurance on departments and faculty members within universities and institutes. By centering graduate education on the relationships between graduate students and faculty members, this policy measure aims to stimulate the agency of the basic component-mentoring relationship-in graduate education. A number of additional policy documents were issued to ensure a healthy and effective mentoring relationship. For example, an official document was issued by MOE—Guidelines on Accomplishing Graduate Supervisors’ Roles and Responsibilities in Cultivating Virtues and Developing Talents in 2018 (MOE, 2018a). The document emphasizes the importance and responsibility of graduate supervisors in overseeing graduate student development. With the issuing of this document, the mentor–mentee relationship in graduate education has received more and more attention in Chinese graduate education.
Overall, the document of Guidelines on Strengthening the Degree and Graduate Education Quality Assurance and Monitoring System was issued along with a series of other policy measures, which together aim to improve the quality of Chinese graduate education. Some of the other accompanying policy documents will be discussed further as follows (The Degrees Committee of the State Council & MOE, 2014a).
4.2 Random Inspection of Master’s and Doctoral Theses
One of the accompanying measures was on the examination of masters’ and doctoral students deposit theses via random sampling inspection. An official document named Measures to Inspect Master’s and Doctoral Deposited Theses through Random Sampling was issued by the Degrees Committee of the State Council and MOE on 2014 (The Degrees Committee of the State Council & MOE, 2014b). This document designates the Degrees Committee of the State Council to be the entity that organizes the doctoral theses random inspection annually. The sampling of doctoral theses is retrieved randomly directly from the State Library. The percentage of sampling is set to be 10 percent. Master theses inspection will be coordinated by provincial-level offices of the Degree Committee. The percentage of sampling varies across different provinces.
Every inspected thesis shall be sent to three experts for double-blind reviews. If two or more out of three experts decide that a thesis did not meet the required standards, it will be scored as “failed”. Institutions that have a high percentage of “theses with problems” will face warnings and possible suspension. Meanwhile, the results of inspection will be regularly provided to degree-granting institutions to improve their graduate education. Moreover, inspection results will be used as one of the key indicators for evaluating the qualification of degree-granting programs. The policy on the inspection of theses has created pressure for degree-granting institutions to closely monitor the quality of graduate education. Many institutions have set up their own double-blind theses inspection systems for increased internal quality control, increasing the percentage of sampling of theses for double-blinded review. Some institutions (e.g., Jiangsu University and Shanghai University) have extended the double-blind theses review process to 100 percent or all doctoral theses.
Within institutions, results are used to evaluate the qualifications of advisors. The results might also affect the allocation of relevant resources (e.g., enrollment quota of graduate students) for degree-granting programs in the institutions. For example, if an advisor had a student whose thesis was marked/rated as “failed”, this advisor might be suspended regarding his/her qualification to recruit new graduate students for designated time period. The advisor’s degree-granting program may also experience a cut in the enrollment quota of new graduate students according to policies set up by some graduate schools.
4.3 Periodic Evaluation of the Degree-Granting Programs
In addition to the results on the inspection of masters and doctoral theses, other relevant indicators were proposed to evaluate degree programs. Concerning the evaluation of the degree-granting programs, an official document on the evaluation process was first issued in 2014 with the latest version issued in 2020 by the Degrees Committee of the State Council. According to the latest version on Measures to Evaluate the Degree-Granting Programs (The Degrees Committee of the State Council & MOE, 2020a), there are two types of evaluation: designated evaluation and periodic evaluation.
Designated evaluation targets new degree-granting programs, while periodic evaluation applies to existing programs. New degree-granting programs will receive a designated evaluation three years after its establishment using a top-down evaluation. Existing programs complete periodic evaluation every six years. It should be noted that periodic evaluation is conducted in a manner that incorporates both self-evaluation and top-down sampling inspection. Self-evaluation is regarded as the primary method for periodic evaluation and quality improvement. In the process of self-evaluation, degree programs are required to establish a self-evaluation indexing system that can reflect their own characteristics in education. Detailed indicators can cover the number and quality of faculty members, the distribution of disciplinary fields, number and quality of graduates, research quality, social services, scholarly communications with other organizations, and indicators on infrastructures and regulatory structures. Internal and external experts will be invited to participate in the peer review process which includes on-site visit. Degree programs are encouraged to participate in international assessments or accreditations. Through all these efforts, degree programs will produce a Self-evaluation Summary Report of Degree-Granting Program along with results from the peer-review process.
On the other hand, top-down inspection usually involves the sampling of about 30% of the total degree-granting programs. Doctoral-level inspection is organized by the Degrees Committee of the State Council, which commissions the task of inspection to the Disciplinary Evaluation Group of the Degrees Committee and the National Professional Degree Graduate Education Committee. Master-level inspection is designated to provincial-level offices of the Degree Committee. The group of external experts will be responsible for peer-review process. The peer-review will be conducted based on materials provided by the degree-granting programs. Such documents or materials can include but is not limited to a Self-evaluation Summary Report of Degree-Granting Program, an Annual Quality Report of Graduate Education of the Program, and an Annual Development Report of Degree-Granting Program. Additional materials include the training plan of graduate education over the past five years, the results from the peer-review process and other documents as required by the expert group. Inspection results will be used to inform the administrative departments in their monitoring of the progress of initiatives such as the Double World-Class Project, and other important decision-making processes, such as deciding on the enrollment scale of a particular institution.
4.4 Autonomy in Setting up Degree Programs
Among all the degree-granting institutions, some institutions were approved to set up their own degree programs autonomously. So far, there are 31 universities that have been granted the authority to set up and adjust their own degree programs. According to the official document—Guidelines on the Self-Auditing of Degree-Granting Process among Higher Education Institutions—issued by the Degrees Committee of the State Council (The Degrees Committee of the State Council, 2018), such autonomy was given to institutions to improve the agency of institutions, enhance the quality of academic research and that of teaching and learning, and encourage institutions to develop their own strengths in their unique disciplines and some cross-disciplinary fields. These approved universities will need to set up the construction and development plan as related to the distribution of disciplines and/or cross-disciplinary fields in considering the developmental plan of their universities. The universities will clarify the developmental goals and distributions of these (cross-) disciplines. Meanwhile, strategic tasks along different phases or stages will need to be specified along with the policy measures or infrastructure that will be in place to ensure such development. These strategic plans will need to be made public and be reported to the Degrees Committee of the State Council.
It should be noted that the set-up of new-degree programs often reflects the strength of a particular university or the strategic needs of the nation or local city. The standards for setting up new degree-granting programs within these universities shall be higher than the basic requirement for similar programs in the nation. For example, in the year of 2020–2021, Tsinghua University re-arranged the distribution of degree-granting programs by adding master’s-degree and doctoral-degree granting programs in integrated circuit science and engineering to reflect their strength in cross-disciplinary research and education in this area. Meanwhile, THU eliminated the master-degree programs in geodesy and surveying engineering. Peking University (PKU) added an interdisciplinary degree program in artificial intelligence (AI) building upon its accumulation of academic research in this field (The Degrees Committee of the State Council, 2021). Also, in the year of 2021, Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU) approved the Master of Education degree (SJTU, 2022). This measure was taken to reflect the needs in Shanghai for more high-quality professional educators in high schools.
The measures on universities’ self-auditing along with the regulations on the evaluation of the degree-granting programs together form the foundation for merit-based dynamic adjustment of degree-granting programs across the nation to encourage continual improvement of graduate education.
4.5 “Application-Review” Procedure for Recruiting Doctoral Students
In the progress of gradually improving graduate education, some important measures were also learned from current best practices and localized to the Chinese system. One of such examples concerns the procedures on recruiting doctoral students. Unified examination has been used for about two decades before Peking University first pioneered a procedure of “Application-Review” for doctorate students’ recruitment in 2003 (Sheng, 2003). This procedure mirrors the common practices in other graduate education systems such the U.S. and U.K., in which prospective students apply to degree programs and submit a list of required documents to support their application (Golde & Walker, 2006; Park, 2005). Through the review processes organized by the university and the program, a committee provides a final decision based on the review of the application materials. After the pioneering effort of Peking University, more and more universities and their degree programs have made efforts to use similar practices for recruiting prospective doctoral students. By 2020, more than 90% of the “Double World-Class” universities adopted this practice for recruiting doctoral students (China Education Online, 2021).
At the master’s degree level, although there is still a nationwide examination for prospective students, more and more students are recruited via a similar “Application-Review” procedure in which incoming students who rank among the top percentiles of their original programs will receive a qualification of “recommendation for admission” and then send applications to target programs. MOE has issued official documents to guide the determination of the percentages of students who can get such qualification of “recommendation for admission”. According to the Methods on Recommending Excellent Graduating Senior Undergraduate Students for Master’s Degrees without Examination (Trial) (MOE, 2006a), the percentages of students who receive this recommendation depend on the types of institutions. For example, universities with existing graduate schools usually can recommend the top 15% of their graduating seniors for admission without examination. In conclusion, recruitment practices such as the listed one, although first “borrowed” from existing systems, they developed some different characteristics as they were adjusted to the Chinese graduate education system.
5 Inspiring Stories
5.1 Tsinghua Shenzhen International Graduate School: Facilitating the Growth and Innovation of China’s Silicon Valley
With the facilitation of the reform and opening-up policy in 1978, Shenzhen, the former small Barren Hamlet with only 20,000 residents, has now become one of the most dynamic developing cities in the world. Known as China’ Silicon Valley, Shenzhen has also grown into a regional financial center and a global technological innovation center, with headquarters for major Chinese companies like Tencent and Huawei.
What is the secret of Shenzhen’s dramatic growth? Apart from China’s reform and opening-up, the establishment of Shenzhen Special Economic Zone and its location, the support of graduate education could be one of the many reasons that has facilitated Shenzhen’s economic and technological development.
By the end of the twentieth century, the key to national power has altered into a competition of science and technology and a skilled workforce. Knowledge and workforce talent have become the most critical resources for city development as well. For Shenzhen, although the city construction has passed the first stage which is characterized by labor-intensive development supported by opening-up and institutional reforms, it encountered a bottleneck in its next stage of development which required human capital and high-tech support.
In 1998, there were approximately 11,000 full-time university students in Shenzhen. Among them, only 60 were master’s students, and none of them were doctoral students. These rates were incompatible with Shenzhen’s economic status and did not provide a foundation for meeting the future goal of being in the highest echelon of the global industrial value chain. To solve the problem, instead of creating its own universities from the scratch, Shenzhen government decided to collaborate with prestigious universities in China and establish branch universities in Shenzhen. Launched in 2001, Tsinghua Graduate School at Shenzhen (GSST), which has now become Tsinghua Shenzhen International Graduate School (SIGS), was one of the earliest and most successful models, which aimed at producing high-level talents for Shenzhen and solving major regional and global problems in science and technology and social development.
The collaboration between Shenzhen government and graduate institutions had an immediate and profound impact on both the development of Shenzhen’s economic and social development and the growth of graduate institutions themselves.
On the one hand, due to the reform and opening-up policy, Shenzhen has relatively flexible policies and an active social environment. Higher education reforms were allowed and more easily explored and implemented in this environment. So as for Tsinghua University, Shenzhen has provided an experimental field to explore new models of graduate education, academic research, and higher education administrative systems. Secondly, due to the physical proximity and interpersonal ties with Hong Kong, Shenzhen also provided a window of collaboration for Tsinghua GSST, which indirectly led to the strategic integration of Tsinghua GSST and Tsinghua-Berkeley Shenzhen Institute (TBSI), which ultimately became Tsinghua SIGS in 2019. As a global technological innovation center, Shenzhen has provided numerous unique opportunities for university-industry collaboration and facilitates the commercialization of latest scientific and research findings in the academic research of Tsinghua GSST.
On the other hand, graduate institutions in return offer key resources to support Shenzhen’s city construction and innovation ecosystem. First, Tsinghua GSST supported the economic and social development of Shenzhen by producing high-quality talents. In 2003, Tsinghua GSST awarded the first batch of master’s students in Shenzhen. In 2004, Tsinghua GSST graduated the first doctoral student in Shenzhen. After two decades of development, it has produced 12,000 graduates and one-third of them decided to stay in Shenzhen. Currently, there are more than 4,600 graduate students in school, among which 700 are doctoral students. To support the graduate education of high-quality students, Tsinghua GSST has attracted a group of excellent faculty members from around the world. Among the more than 200 faculty members, half have received Shenzhen’s various high-level talents’ titles and over 30 have received national and provincial level talents’ awards. It is expected that by 2025, there will be 250 faculty members in total with 1/5 of them being international faculty.
Second, Tsinghua has facilitated the transformation and updated Shenzhen’s industry by the development of (inter-/cross-) disciplinary and frontier academic research. Tsinghua GSST has been very strategic in the planning of research fields since its establishment, targeting the frontiers of the field while tying closely to the needs of Shenzhen. Particularly, throughout the strategic planning of Tsinghua GSST’s academic research, talent development and its service to Shenzhen, the key feature lies in their focus on inter-disciplinary and cross-disciplinary development. Depending on the rich resources of Tsinghua University, the Tsinghua GSST attempts to explore an independent developmental model. By focusing on unique disciplines and the key characteristics of existing disciplines, Tsinghua GSST has emphasized inter-disciplinary and cross-disciplinary collaboration, producing a number of unique disciplines compared to the Tsinghua main campus in Beijing.
In Tsinghua GSST/Tsinghua SIGS, these unique disciplines reflect both the local needs in Shenzhen and the strength of Tsinghua faculty. Based on these unique fields, Tsinghua GSST/Tsinghua SIGS formed a selected array of departments and research centers that are very different from their main campus, such as Department of Advanced Manufacturing, Department of Logistics and Transportation, Department of Information Science and Technology, Tsinghua Research Center on Hong Kong and Macau, Research Institute on Biomedicine and Health Engineering, Research Institute on Marine Engineering, Research Institute on Innovative Management, and Research Institute on Future Human Habitats (Tsinghua SIGS, n.d.). During the 13th Five-Year Plan (2016–2020) alone, Tsinghua SIGS had launched eight National Key R&D projects, six provincial level key R&D projects, established one National Key Laboratory, five provincial level engineering and technological centers, one Sino-Germany joint innovation center, two Shenzhen Nobel-prize scientists’ laboratories, and many other municipal innovation platforms. These efforts target the critical research problems both at the national-level and at the municipal level.
The development and output of these departments and research institutes/centers have played a key and active role not only in promoting the development of Shenzhen’s strategically important fields, such as information science, biopharmaceutical and health engineering, and city construction, but also in offering excellent platforms for graduate students’ training by international collaboration and industrial-university cooperation. For example, a graduate student group from Tsinghua SIGS won the 40th World Architecture Community Awards in April 2022 with their project, “Super-Hydro-City!”, which was designed to combat rising sea levels and provide a future solution city construction for Shenzhen Bay (Tsinghua SIGS, 2022a, b). The project was a part of a graduate-level course hosted in the Research Institute on Future Human Habitats, where leading professors from around the globe collaborated to jointly delivered the course (World Architecture Community, 2022). Also, the close connections with the industry have provided students with unique platforms to accomplish their dreams. Another recent example, Xingchen Song, a master’s student in computer technology, with a dream of “seeing the sound” that was inspired by his own difficult experiences with hearing loss caused by a disease from youth, has pursued a research interest in automatic speech recognition. Thanks to the close collaboration between local tech companies and Tsinghua SIGS, in a required practicum course in the professional graduate degree program, he was able to engage in real-world projects and successfully developed milestone tools for automatic speech recognition systems, which have so far been applied in over 100 companies. In his own words, such experiences allowed him to “take one big step closer to future goals and dream…seeing the sound, I have made it” (Lin, 2022).
In addition to Tsinghua SIGS, several other graduate schools were also attracted to such a win–win developmental model for graduate institutions and local city. For example, Peking University Shenzhen Graduate School and Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT)-Shenzhen Graduate School (later became HIT, Shenzhen, having both undergraduate and graduate education) were also established in 2001. With different strengths in research fields and varied styles in graduate education, these institutions have each supported the swift development of Shenzhen’s knowledge economy and technological development in various ways.
5.2 University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences: Progressing Along with National Strategic Development
Under the direct leadership of the Chinese Academy of Science (CAS), the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (UCAS) is a public university that primarily focuses on graduate-level education (ScienceNet, 2015). It originated from the pioneering graduate educational practice of CAS which took place right after the founding of the People’s Republic of China. In 1950, CAS launched the graduate researchers’ recruitment and development. In 1951, CAS and MOE issued an official document to recruit graduate researchers and graduate students. These were some of the earliest explorations of graduate education practices in China. In 1951, the national enrollment of graduate students was 276, among which 95 were recruited by the CAS. To further facilitate the growth of scientific talents, CAS decided to organize graduate education in a more systematic way. In 1954, CAS’s executive meeting passed the Temporary Regulations for Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Graduate Students. The document was examined and officially issued by the State Council of China the same year. This file signified the official establishment of a standard graduate education procedure within CAS. From 1955 to 1965, CAS recruited 1,517 graduate students, accounting for ten percent of the number of recruitments in the whole nation. In 1965, the number of in-school graduate students accounted for a quarter of all graduate students in the nation. The educational goal at the time was to develop graduate students that can “conduct scientific research in an independent, professional, and creative manner”. Many of the early graduates have taken up critical roles in the scientific research and technological advancement in China. Evidently, CAS played an essential role for educating future scientists at the time.
China’s graduate education was forced to stop completely during 1966 to 1976. In 1977, CAS restored its graduate education through efforts to facilitate the issue of the Notice on Recruiting Graduate Students in Higher Education Institutions in 1977, which was officially sent out by CAS and MOE, commissioning University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) to establish a graduate school in Beijing to recruit graduate students on behalf of CAS (ScienceNet, 2015). The issue of this document also symbolized the overall restoration of graduate education in China. In 1978 the Graduate School of USTC was founded as the first graduate school in China. CAS again played a critical role in its pioneering effort in restarting graduate education. After the document of Degree Regulations of China was issued in 1980, then the Director of CAS – Yi Fang-was appointed to be the first director of the Degrees Committee of the State Council. Moreover, among the first group of eighteen doctoral degree recipients with their degrees awarded in 1983, six of them received degrees from the Graduate School of USTC (Beijing). (It should be noted that the Graduate School of USTC [Heifei] was founded in 1986, which recruits graduate students for USTC].
In 2000, building upon the efforts of the Graduate School of the USTC(Beijing) and the graduate educational practices that were taking place in the 109 institutes across the nation leading by CAS, CAS established the Graduate School of CAS. In 2012, the Graduate School of CAS was renamed as the UCAS. The establishment of UCAS carried with it the long history of CAS’s experiences in graduate education (UCAS, n.d.).
At present, UCAS, backed by 116 CAS research institutes all over the country, 306 high-level laboratories and nearly 12,900 academics (including 239 members of CAS and 40 members of the Chinese Academy of Engineering), provides an excellent platform for graduate education (UCAS, n.d.). Leading scientists are closely involved in course teaching, scientific training, and guiding graduate students’ dissertations. Meanwhile, the excellent research platforms provided by more than 100 institutes have allowed top-class research environment for graduate students’ research practices. Also, due to its unique relationship with CAS, UCAS adopted a “two-phase” training system, in which students first learned fundamental courses and skills in the UCAS and then joined CAS research institutes for later research work under the guidance of graduate mentors, completing their dissertations in the research institutes. This graduate education model features a deep blending of scientific research and teaching and learning (UCAS, n.d.).
Looking back, UCAS has carried out many “first-time experiences” in Chinese graduate education. It graduated China’s first doctoral student in science, first doctoral student in engineering, first female doctoral student, and first student with double doctoral degrees. In the past 60 years, UCAS has in total produced more than 195,000 graduate students, including both doctoral level and master level (UCAS, n.d.). In 2014, UCAS began recruiting students at the bachelor’s level as well. Since 1964, among the graduates of UCAS, 161 have been elected as members of CAS. Among the recipients of the National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars, one quarter of them graduated from UCAS.
Historically UCAS’s higher education focus has been on cultivating graduate students, many of whom have contributed to various strategic fields of the national development. Among one of the many examples, Nan Rendong was the former Chief Scientist, Chief Engineer of the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (FAST), which is the largest and most sensitive single-aperture radio telescope. He was a UCAS alumnus who enrolled in 1978. Exploring the mystery of the universe had been Nan’s career pursuit. To design and implement this arduous project, which involves knowledge and skills from multiple fields including astronomy, mechanics, mechanical engineering and geotechnical engineering, he conducted innovative work while exploring the unknown territory. He kept learning, mastering the key processes in the engineering project via the accumulation of knowledge in mechanics, measurement and control, hydrology, geology. In 2016, FAST was successfully built and put into function, which greatly helped astronomical exploration of Chinese scientists. However, he passed away in 2017, spending the last 22 years of his life working tirelessly and finally accomplished this enormous project. He once wrote down a poem, “All senses feel peaceful, every sound quite down. The marvelous universe, in its mystery and beauty, is calling us to overcome mediocrity, entering its limitless expanse…” (Liang, 2019). It is inspiring to witness such a great life and his work and how his work has contributed to a marvelous scientific advance for the nation and beyond.
Nowadays, the education of UCAS has been keeping pace with national strategic needs. For example, to solve the bottleneck problems of integrated circuit and semiconductor technological deficiency and the lack of domestic talents in such fields, UCAS launched the “one student one chip” plan (Luo, 2021). The plan includes students in the design and development of integrated circuits. As semiconductor chips are at the crux of the technology competition among countries and chip production is a priority in China’s Five-Year Plans, such a plan will undoubtedly narrow the gap in semiconductor talents in the near future.
6 Latest Research
6.1 Overview of the Chinese Graduate Education Research
With the fast expansion of graduate education in China, scholarly research has also taken up momentum. On the one hand, the quick growth of Chinese graduate education has provided an excellent field for educational research exploration. On the other hand, the scholarly exploration on these expanded educational practices have offered evidence-based support for continual improvement of Chinese graduate education.
To synthesize the main themes and trends based on the Mandarin literature on Chinese graduate education, analysis in this chapter uses the full-text database of Chinese journals—CNKI, as the database to analyze the literature. “Graduate education” was used as the keyword. The time duration for the literature analyses is set from January 1, 2011 to December 31, 2021. The search results are further refined to include only the core journals focusing on higher education. Only journals that are indexed in the CSSCI are included. A total of 4,123 articles are retrieved manually by filtering out articles that do not meet the requirements or were repeatedly published. Based on the retrieved literature, this section provides an overview of the current Chinese literature on graduate education, followed by an introduction of the main themes and key trends of research in graduate education among the Mandarin literature over the past 10 years.
In terms of the publication venues, the statistics of journals that showed a focus on graduate education are summarized in Table 3. According to the statistical results, some journals show trends to publish more research on graduate education than others. Articles on graduate education are found primarily in five main journals including, “Academic Degree & Graduate Education” (1,479), “Journal of Graduate Education” (589), “Research on Chinese Higher Education” (138), “Higher Education Exploration” (68), “Journal of Higher Education” (65). In particular, the journal of “Academic Degree & Graduate Education” produced 1,479 articles, accounting for 35.9% of the total number of articles. The number of publications of Journal of Graduate Education ranked second, with the total number of 589 accounting for 14.3%. Both journals are academic journals with great influence in the field of graduate education. They each focus on important theoretical issues, major practical challenges, and the latest trends in graduate education, with the aim of exploring innovative ways to advance graduate education.
Concerning the research topics of graduate education, an analysis of keywords of the 4,243 retrieved articles was conducted. The top 30 keywords and their corresponding frequency counts are shown in Fig. 21. A thematic grouping of these keywords leads to four main themes that will be discussed in the following section. The themes can help the understanding of the development trends and research hotspots in graduate education.
Source Compiled from search results from CNKI
Top 30 keywords in graduate education literature.
6.2 Main Themes and Key Trends
The main themes highlight the key points and core trends of the topics of these research articles. The research themes related to graduate education in the past 10 years can be summarized into the following four aspects.
6.2.1 Educational Models and Modes of Graduate Students
The keywords involved in this topic include educational models and modes, graduate students’ training, training models/modes of graduate students, methods for graduate education, graduate students’ curriculum, graduate education reform and so on. Educational models/modes refer to teaching and learning methods, a series of carefully designed graduate student courses or curricular system, or a series of well-thought-out training courses/learning activities/programs in the graduate educational practices. More specifically, the research on the educational models/modes of graduate students involves multiple research content, including the exploration, construction, and reformation of these educational models for the purpose of identifying a more reasonable graduate educational model. This line of research remains closer to the scholarship of application, often introducing a particular model that has been implemented at a particular institution or degree-granting program. With the pros and cons offered by practitioners summarized from their practical experiences of implementation, providing lessons-learned for other practitioners. Some of the research might use surveys or interviews to collect empirical data. However, the survey tools used in some research might require further validation, in that evidence-based research of the actual implementation of the educational models might be in need for further exploration. Still many others were position papers, summarizing the challenges and opportunities in particular educational models based upon reflections of practitioners’ experiences instead of evidence-based data. Only a small portion of research conducted in this line utilized well-tested survey instruments or well-designed interview protocols to explore the outcomes of the educational models under investigation. Despite the small number, these studies reflect the effectiveness of some unique training models for graduate students (Chen & Dong, 2009; Zhou et al., 2015), demonstrating some of the promising outcomes of graduate educational reform (Huang & Yi, 2014; Li, 2005). It should be noted here that the trend of relying on reflections of practitioners with more position papers than evidence-based research unfortunately has been a general trend across all four themes. This trend, although having started to change, remains to be common in Chinese higher educational research (Yuan & Huang, 2022).
6.2.2 Professional Degree Graduate Education
The keywords involved in this topic include professional degree, professional degree graduate education, professional degree graduate students, Master of Engineering, and professional masters. The themes on professional degree graduate education mainly included research on introducing international best practices, domestic best practices, or research on educational practices. Additional research also explored educational models for professional degree graduate education. Chinese graduate education has witnessed an increasing interest for professional degree graduate education. Professional degree education has become an essential part of Chinese graduate education, picking up in both quantity and quality. Despite a large portion of journal articles being position papers, these reflection-based articles pointed to some common problems in professional degree education. First, the training of professional degree graduate students showed limited difference from that of academic degree graduate students (Hu, 2006). This phenomenon can be problematic because the two models are designed towards producing different types of professionals, one being research-oriented and the other being application-oriented (Wen et al., 2010). Other related problems are the lack of practical learning experiences for professional degree graduate students. Moreover, the collaboration between university and industry needs to be strengthened for professional graduate education. Also, the assessment of graduate students pursuing professional degrees versus academic degree requires different criteria which have yet to be clearly defined. Combined with the basic characteristics of professional degree graduate students, exploring their appropriate training modes and assessment should require greater attention from researchers (Huang, 2010).
6.2.3 Quality Assurance System of Graduate Education
The establishment and improvement of a holistic quality assurance system for graduate education is the key to improving the quality of graduates and ensuring the high-quality development of graduate education. The establishment of a holistic quality assurance system has always been the core task of graduate education and aroused continuous attention of scholars over the past decade. The keywords involved in this topic include the quality of graduate education and the quality of training. More specifically, research that involves quality assurance relates to topics such as the establishment of internal quality assurance system, various concrete measures that have been taken to ensure quality in graduate education, and the effectiveness of such measures or systems (Wang, 2015; Wang & Li, 2012). Journal articles that summarize prior experiences and best practices in setting up quality assurance systems within an institution or a degree-program revealed some common practices in Chinese graduate education. Some of the practices include measures such as, the double-blinded review of theses and dissertations, evaluations of course teaching through student reports and external seasoned instructors’ field observations, standardizing the types and procedures in organizing milestone exams for graduate students (e.g., Qualifying exams and preliminary exams), and standardizing the procedures in organizing the recruitment process of new graduate students to ensure equality, fairness and public accountability (Liao et al., 2012; Rong & Deng, 2018; Zhao & Zhou, 2011).
6.2.4 Graduate Supervisors’ Skill Development
The keyword involved in this topic is graduate supervisors. Supervisors play an extremely important role in the process of graduate training. As stated in national policies, graduate supervisors are regarded as the first responsible person for graduate students’ education. Therefore, developing a large group of qualified supervisors can directly affect the quality of graduate training and how to develop a group of high-quality supervisors for graduates has attracted more and more attention among the researchers. Some research, especially research on educational administration, covers topics such as the selection, management, supervision, and evaluation of graduate mentors (Pan & Gu, 2022; Wang, 2005). Additional researchers pay attention to the relationship between mentors and graduate students, studying topics such as graduate students’ satisfactory levels with the mentoring and the impacting factors (Zhou et al., 2010). Still other literature covers topics on graduate supervisors’ professional development, in particular the challenges they may encounter and the possible ways they might navigate to succeed in their careers (Bao & Yang, 2021; Zhao & Feng, 2021). Such literature reveals trends in the common problems faced by graduate mentors in Chinese graduate education. These problems include the need to balance research and teaching, the lack of proper training in pedagogical skills, and the need for training to perform their duties of mentoring students especially for different types of students (professional versus academic ones) (Xue et al., 2022).
6.2.5 Additional Research Themes
Besides these four main themes, there are a couple additional themes that also attract scholars’ attention, one of them being the ideological and political education of graduate students. In recent years, promoting the construction of “course-based ideological and political education” comprehensively has become an important topic encouraged by quite a few national policies. Research in this area often discusses ways to infuse ideological and political education into professional courses. Another theme was about the cultivation of innovation ability for graduate students. Graduate education is regarded as one of the key platforms for developing high-level innovative talents. Therefore, cultivating graduate students’ innovative ability has long been a hot topic in Chinese graduate education. Research hotspots on the cultivation of graduate students’ innovation ability mainly involve the training mode or mechanism related to developing innovation ability among graduate students, the curriculum system and teaching methods, the training environment, and the differences in the cultivation of innovation ability among different types of graduate students.
Overall, the recent trends in the research of Chinese graduate education reveal some existing challenges for graduate students’ training and the professional development of graduate mentors. Challenges are also presented in terms of the education of professional degree graduate students. Current research mainly conducted based upon practitioners’ reflections has offered some valuable suggestions to solve some of these problems. Nevertheless, to provide more practical suggestions, more evidence-based educational research is yet to be conducted to investigate the actual causes of such challenges or problems.
7 National Policies
7.1 Foundational Policies
Over the past four decades, the strong national policies and relevant measures provided by the Chinese government have rendered great support for the development of graduate education in China. Shortly after the commission of the Graduate School of USTC by CAS, the issue of Degree Regulations of the People’s Republic of China in 1980 set the foundation for later policies in graduate education (National People’s Congress, 2004). Chinese graduate education was then set on a path of gradual progress after 1977. The Degrees Committee of the State Council (later became a joint office with the Department of Degree Management and Graduate Education, MOE) is responsible for the strategic reform and planning of the national graduate education and the administration of graduate educational practices. The continual efforts of the administrative office in guiding the national development of graduate education have allowed a steady progress of Chinese graduate education in terms of the setup and evaluation of degree-granting institutions or programs, reform and continual improvement in graduate education, international collaboration with foreign institutions in graduate education and many other works related to graduate education.
7.2 Recent Key Policies
In 2013, a key policy document was officially proposed after the Eighteenth National Congress of the Communist Party of China (2012), that is, the Guidelines on Deepening Graduate Education Reform (MOE et al., 2013). This document points out that the Chinese graduate education had entered a new developmental era. The strategic roles of graduate education in promoting innovation-driven development and increasing global competitiveness have been emphasized in many countries. Therefore, it is imperative to conduct comprehensive reformation in Chinese graduate education, to produce high-quality talent that can support innovation at the national level. The two key measures are coined, one being the reformation of educational models according to different categories of degrees, another being the establishment of quality assurance system for graduate education. Many of the recently proposed policies are closely related to this key document. Here, this chapter summarizes the main three lines of policies that in a sense highlight some of the key characteristics of Chinese graduate education.
7.2.1 Quality-Centered Intensive Development
Quality of graduate education has been the focus of a series of national policies. A number of key regulations and documents were issued to offer guiding principles for various aspects of graduate educational practices. As mentioned in the previous best practice section, these documents emphasize quality assurances by engaging multiple stakeholders in the process and stressing the agency of institutions. Institutional agencies are partly demonstrated in the process of setting up degree programs autonomously for some institutions. Additional measures that ensure quality control include the random inspection of master’s and doctoral theses and the regular evaluation of degree-granting programs. In addition, some measures are proposed to place strong emphasis on the importance of the mentoring relationships between faculty members and graduate students, recognizing “the supervisor being the first responsible person for graduate students’ education” (MOE, 2018a).
The overall of national policy that focuses on quality assurance in graduate education includes a series of documents; one of the most important ones being Guidelines on Strengthening the Degree and Graduate Education Quality Assurance and Monitoring System (The Degrees Committee of the State Council & MOE, 2014a). Establishing a quality assurance and monitoring system involves efforts in various aspects. Therefore, a number of other documents were issued along with this document. Specific policies that are related to various measures to implement the core ideas in this document include policies in the following different areas.
First, in terms of the evaluation of degree-granting programs, there are several related measures, for example, Measures to Evaluate the Degree-Granting Programs (The Degrees Committee of the State Council & MOE, 2014c), and Methods for the Dynamic Adjustment of Doctoral, Master’s Degree-Granting Discipline and Professional Degree Granting Categories (The Degrees Committee of the State Council, 2015). These documents delineate specific procedures, standards, and essential documentations for evaluating degree-granting programs in institutions. In addition, the Degrees Committee of the State Council regularly announces lists of degree-granting programs that have been terminated or added after the evaluation and the dynamic adjustment. Second, as related to the quality control of graduate dissertations, the main document has been the Measures to Inspect Master’s and Doctoral Deposited Theses through Random Sampling (The Degrees Committee of the State Council & MOE, 2014b). The document provides guidelines for implementing blind-review procedures for theses across the various institutional types. Third, as for the autonomy in setting up degree programs, main policies that cover relevant materials include Methods to Audit the Granting of Doctoral and Masters’ Degree (The Degrees Committee of the State Council, 2017), and Guidelines on the Self-Auditing of Degree-Granting Process among Higher Education Institutions (The Degrees Committee of the State Council, 2018). These documents offer basic requirements about new degree-granting programs and auditing procedures to guide institutions in their practices. Fourth, for the assessment and evaluation of graduate advisors, quite a few new policies were proposed concerning this area, including Guidelines on Accomplishing Graduate Supervisors’ Roles and Responsibilities in Cultivating Virtues and Developing Talents (MOE, 2018a), and Graduate Supervisor’s Mentoring Behavioral Guideline (MOE, 2020c). These documents not only list the general responsibilities of mentors, but also provide guidelines about graduate advisors’ promotion and evaluation. Finally, for the “Application-Review” procedure for recruiting doctoral students, the main policy document was Methods on Recommending Excellent Graduating Senior Undergraduate Students for Master’s Degrees without Examination (Trial) (MOE, 2006a). Although it was proposed before the 2013 document on deepening the graduate education reform, the practice of “Application-Review” procedure has gone through continual refinement and wider adoption after the 2013 document, proving itself an important measure for ensuring the quality of recruitment of graduate students. These policy documents and measures focus on different aspects of graduate education, together aiming at constructing a system of quality assurance for Chinese graduate education.
It should be noted that many of these measures mirror some of the accountability check measures of the ones that are implemented in the existing graduate education systems such as in the U.S. institutions or programs (Council for Higher Education Accreditation [CHEA], n.d.) and in the U.K. system (Quality Assurance Agency [QAA], n.d.). For example, in the external quality review process in the US, peer reviews are often based on solid evidence such as written reports, site visits and interviews conducted by external experts (CHEA, n.d.). Meanwhile, the internal quality review process can include student evaluation, review of faculty performance (such as tenure and promotion reviews), and other types of internal quality control measures. However, there are also noticeable differences between the Chinese graduate education system and the ones found in the existing developed countries. For example, the external peer reviews for U.S. institutions are often conducted by non-profit organizations, while in the case of Chinese graduate education, the MOE has played the leading role in this process. Together, the implementation of many of these polices and measures, while echoing some of the measures in existing graduate educational systems of developed countries such as the U.S., still demonstrates features that are unique to the context of Chinese graduate education.
7.2.2 Innovations on the Training Process
Considering the ever-increasing complicated demands for the skills and attributes towards graduate students, another key line of national policies and measures focuses on encouraging innovations on the students’ training process. In the Guidelines on Deepening Graduate Education Reform (MOE et al., 2013), one of the two key measures was to reform educational models according to different categories of degrees. Such innovations on graduate education target the development of different types of degree students to respond to the various needs and demands of technological, social, and economic development of current society. To meet these needs, this line of policies and measures focused on education innovations such as initiating professional degree programs, experimenting dual-mentor structure for graduate education, diversifying the career developmental paths of doctoral students, and emphasizing cross-disciplinary skill development for students.
First, in terms of setting up professional degree programs, in 1990, the Degrees Committee of the State Council passed two documents: Reports on Investigations to Setting up Professional Degrees, and Several Guidelines on Setting up and Piloting MBA Degree Education. In 1991, nine universities were approved to pilot MBA degree education, signifying the beginning of professional graduate degree education in China. Later, series of national polices were issued to improve the educational process, including, Several Guidelines on Strengthen and Improving Professional Degree Education, Overall Developmental Plan for Master’s and Doctoral Professional Graduate Degree Programs, and Methods for Setting up and Auditing Professional Master’s and Doctoral Degree Programs. More recent documents include Developmental Plan for Professional Graduate Degree Programs (2020–2025) (The Degrees Committee of the State Council & MOE, 2020b). This document points out that by 2025, China will increase the scale of professional master’s degree students’ enrollment to 2/3 of all master’s students. Also, the number of professional doctoral degree students’ enrollment will be greatly increased.
Second, to promote educational innovation in the training process, MOE proposed documents such as Notice on Implementing Comprehensive Reformative Piloting Projects for Doctoral Education to encourage institutions to apply for pilot projects meeting the listed guidelines in the document (MOE, 2019c). The guidelines that were related to innovations in the training process include strengthening graduate students’ professional development, improving graduate mentors’ academic ability and practical experiences, exploring the engagement of industrial representatives in graduate mentoring, increasing graduate students’ international experiences for scholarly communications and other aspects. Within the proposed projects, institutions can draft their own goals according to their own strengths in graduate education. The pilot institutions will submit documents to MOE regularly to report on the progress of the projects. The official website of MOE made open some of best practices emerging in the pilot efforts across different institutions. Additional related documents include, the Temporary Methods for the Joint Development of Doctoral Students between Higher Education Institutions and Research Institutes (MOE, 2009), Guidelines on Improving and Strengthening Graduate Courses Development (MOE, 2014). Documents like these point to the directions for further improving graduate education by optimizing the curriculum and identifying innovative practices to diversify the training process.
These policy documents and measures focus on reforming and innovating the graduate training process. Together they aim to produce graduate-level talents that can adapt to the changes of social, economic and technological development of the Chinese society. Many of the proposed measures can find counterparts in the existing graduate education systems in the developed countries. For example, the training of professional graduate students has been established and further improved in the U.K. and quite a few European countries, such as Germany and Sweden. The U.K. has set up specialized centers for the training of professional engineering doctoral degrees. In such training centers, students are provided with opportunities to work with industrial-oriented projects along with comprehensive skill training (Association of Engineering Doctorates, n.d.). In the measures proposed in the Overall Developmental Plan for Master’s and Doctoral Professional Graduate Degree Programs by the Degrees Committee of the State Council, emphases were also put on involving the multiple stakeholders for professional degree education (The Degrees Committee of the State Council, 2010). Representatives from the industry sectors were encouraged to participate in the training process. Moreover, professional degree programs feature different training focus than that of the academic degree programs. The target prospective students’ groups are also different. Such differences in prospective student groups are further accomplished by the alternative students recruiting procedure for students who apply for the professional degree programs.
7.2.3 Strengthening International Cooperation
In response to the trend of economic globalization, measures concerning internationalization were proposed in the higher education realm to facilitate international collaboration. The third line of policies and measures focus on strengthening scholarly communications of graduate students with international peers and the collaborative training of graduate students between domestic and international higher education entities. Additional measures have also been proposed to attract international students to the Chinese graduate education system.
In terms of increasing domestic graduate students’ experiences in international scholarly communications, some of the official regulations include, Measures for the Selection Procedure of State-financed Graduate Students for Studying Abroad (MOE, 2006b), and Regulations for the Management of Chinese Government Overseas Graduate Students (Trial) (MOE & Ministry of Finance, 2007). Through such measures, a number of domestic graduate students received the opportunities to be exposed to graduate education in many developed countries, such as the U.S. and the U.K.
As the competitiveness and attractiveness of Chinese graduate education increase, more and more international students choose China for their graduate studies. To ensure the educational quality of international graduate students to China, there have been also important policies and measures, such as the issuing of the Study in China Plan by MOE (2010a). The plan solidifies the existing structure for attracting international students by delineating a series of guidelines covering areas such as the recruitment, scholarship, administration, curriculum, and many other aspects as related to international students’ study in China. Additional measures regulate the procedures for foreign students’ application of state scholarships. Recently, another important document—the Quality Standards on the Higher Education of International Students in China (Trial) was issued by MOE (2018b). This document set the standards for international students’ education in China. It covers various areas in higher education including graduate education, such as the creation of majors that accept international students, the degree-granting process, student management, and other aspects in higher education.
To facilitate scholarly communications and increase the share of excellent educational resources, joint programs and branch campuses of international leading university in China have been increasing over the past several decades. Meanwhile, some Chinese universities have grasped the opportunities to establish overseas campus for graduate education. For example, the SJTU-Asia–Pacific Graduate Institute was established in 2019 in Singapore. Implementation Measures for the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Chinese-foreign Cooperation in Running Schools has been one of the important policies to give support and guidance. The topic of international education will be further discussed in Chap. 11 of this book.
8 Summary
In conclusion, Chinese graduate education has experienced a rapid growth in both quantity and quality in comparison to the data from the current leading graduate education systems. The national-level policies have played an irreplaceable role in guiding the direction of Chinese graduate education development. Meanwhile, the arduous piloting and experimentation of leading universities and institutions in the graduate educational practices have contributed to a variety of educational innovations that have gradually diffused to other universities and institutions in the nation. Through a continual devotion to improve the overall quality, learning both from the leading existing graduate education systems and from the local trials and errors at various levels (course-level, departmental-level, and university-level), Chinese graduate education has developed unique characteristics that reflect the needs of its social and economic environment.
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Zhu, J., Zhang, Y., Zheng, C. (2024). Graduate Education in China. In: Niancai, L., Zhuolin, F., Qi, W. (eds) Education in China and the World. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-5861-0_6
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