(Intern reporter He Rui) The Ministry of Education and the National Open University have been implementing the "One College Student in One Village Plan" for 19 years in order to cultivate rural local talents who can "stay, use, understand technology and manage". The reporter learned from the National Open University yesterday that the program has covered 29 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities), with a total enrollment of 1,026,900 students and 710,200 farmers’ graduates.
The "One College Student in One Village" program has been implemented since 2004. It is aimed at enrolling rural youth who have graduated from high schools (vocational high schools and technical secondary schools) or have the same educational level, and encourages demobilized veterans, agricultural science and technology demonstration households, village cadres and employees of township enterprises to participate in the study. Every year, each village recruits a college student, and adopts the form of distance open education and on-the-job amateur study to cultivate rural practical scientific and technological talents and management talents at the level of higher vocational and technical education.
In the just-started autumn semester, the program offered undergraduate majors such as landscape architecture, horticulture, rural regional development, and administrative management, as well as specialized majors such as facility agriculture and equipment, leisure agriculture operation and management, gardening technology, and modern agricultural economic management. The student status is valid for eight years from the date of enrollment. The minimum length of study for undergraduate majors in senior high schools is five years, and the minimum length of study for undergraduate majors and junior colleges is two and a half years. Students can obtain the required credits for graduation within the validity period of their school status, and they can obtain a nationally certified graduation certificate if they meet the graduation conditions.
Up to now, more than 2,200 learning centers in 45 branches of China Development University have participated in the implementation of the plan, helping more than 1.02 million farmers realize their university dreams. The school said that it will strengthen cooperation with local leading enterprises and breeding bases, establish practical education bases, and hire agricultural experts, rural cadres, agricultural entrepreneurs and agricultural experts with practical experience as instructors to enhance students’ innovation and entrepreneurship ability; Share online education and teaching resources to achieve full coverage of scattered, wide-ranging and large-scale farmers.