A key meeting on graduate education held on Thursday, 5 March, underlined the need to coordinate epidemic control and graduate education development to meet targets set for this year.

The meeting was held in the form of video conference. Vice president Yan Jianhua and Vice Secretary of the Party Committee Wu Xiaocheng attended the meeting and gave speeches. Vice President Zhou Tianhua presided over the meeting.

Yan highlighted five key points to promote the development of graduate education. First, we should continue to cultivate soul and educate people, promote the collaborative interaction of tutors, graduate students and administrators, and build a good graduate education ecological environment. Second, we should optimize the system and mechanism, promote the ten action plans of comprehensive reform of doctoral education with high-quality cooperation in science and education, and deepen the comprehensive reform of professional degree graduate education with high-level integration of industry and education. Third, we should promote the integration of science and education, combine multi-disciplines, make up for shortcomings, and promote the construction of first-class discipline ecosystem. Fourth, we should take the initiative to turn the crisis into an opportunity, ensure our graduate degree awarding, graduate enrollment and other related work is more concrete, more meticulous and better implemented during the epidemic prevention and control period, stay united, work hard and provide a strong talent guarantee and intellectual support for building a world-class university with Chinese characteristics.

Wu said at the meeting that the epidemic prevention and control had changed from "closed control" to "precise intelligent control", the ideological and political work and teaching should be arranged with precision and intelligence, planned in advance, coordinated with each other and implemented with responsibility. He stressed that the Party construction among graduate students proceeded from five aspects: First, we should help the students to set up great ambition. Second, we should reaffirm the importance of upholding Party leadership over work in all areas and aspects. Third, we should reconstruct the ideological and political curriculum. Fourth, we should make scientific employment strategy for the graduates. Fifth, we should establish an incentive-security mechanism. We should develop subjective initiative in fulfilling our responsibilities.

The related leaders of Graduate School made arrangements on epidemic prevention and control work related to graduate education and stressed overcoming the impact of COVID-19 to comprehensively put into practice the work plans of building the outstanding graduate education. More than 400 people attended the meeting online, including heads of schools and colleges, relevant postgraduate academic administrators, etc.