Jiangxi fine-tunes talent to better meet rising market needs

A Sino-foreign joint event is becoming a microcosm of a Chinese industry-education alliance being expanded globally amid the country's urge to boost high-quality Belt and Road cooperation.

Held for the first time outside of Malaysia, the 2025 iSpark International Entrepreneurship Competition attracted 70 entrepreneurial projects that competed over two days at Jiangxi Vocational College of Foreign Studies, which was founded in 1964.

The final of the event kicked off with 270 young entrepreneurs from eight countries and 16 universities vying for honors.

Liu Hongxia, a JXCFS student with her "Green Bamboo Technology" project team, and another JXCFS team promoting their "microporous and light porcelain" project, garnered two gold medals. In addition, JXCFS students won two bronze medals and two awards of excellence.

On June 27, 2025, the Tiangong College Alliance was established at JXCFS, grouping 101 universities and colleges, and 18 enterprises in Jiangxi province, and borrowing its name from Tiangong Kaiwu (The Exploitation of the Works of Nature) — a book by Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) scientist Song Yingxing from Jiangxi.

In its first six months, the alliance had established Tiangong Workshops in seven countries, including Southeast Asia's first at Tunku Abdul Rahman University of Management and Technology in Malaysia.

Zhu Longliang, JXCFS president, said vocational education must make innovations that truly serve industries.

In Jiangxi, which is undergoing a critical economic transformation and upgrading, over 2,000 e-commerce enterprises urgently need multi-skilled talent, and rural vitalization badly needs e-commerce talent to empower agricultural products.

Xu Zhenjing, head of a local cross-border e-commerce enterprise, said:"Our biggest headache is not being unable to recruit people, but in recruits offering real help."

"Many new recruits don't know ERP (enterprise resource planning) systems, overseas warehouse operations, and even can't understand basic cross-border logistics processes," he said.

"The traditional talent training model is struggling to accurately match industrial demand," Zhu said, adding that JXCFS has launched a systematic revolution in talent cultivation founded in three key areas — school-enterprise cooperation, competition-learning enhancement and integration of knowledge and practice.

Zhu said its school-enterprise cooperation has led to over 30 courses and 15 practical-training textbooks, while the practice of "using competition to promote learning and teaching" has helped 2,000 students obtain innovation credits through attending school, provincial and national-level contests.

The college has invested over 30 million yuan ($4.4 million) in building training bases covering all majors, including over 100 teaching bases outside of school, said Rao Jianhua, JXCFS vice-president.

Liu Cheng, an international business major, said he once attended a four-week "semester project" and a six-month "on-job internship".

"During the semester project, I was assigned to participate in enterprise projects — from market research to program execution," he said, noting that his internship at a cross-border e-commerce company helped him independently operate a store within six months.

This three-way integration approach not only helped the students, but also the teachers.

"In the past, when we were in class, we just followed the textbook and didn't have any real experiences," Liu said.

Huang Jiajing, a teacher from the school of e-commerce, said that "it's different now, as we have to go to companies each year to practice and return with projects."

The proportion of "dual qualification" teachers in JXCFS has reached 65 percent.

Zhou Wei, dean of the school of innovation and entrepreneurship, said so far, JXCFS' new move has helped more than 200 Jiangxi enterprises explore overseas markets and gain significant benefits.

"The students have served the enterprises in a real market environment, honing their abilities and contributing to local economic development," Zhou said.

The overall employment rate for the 2023 JXCFS graduates reached 97.8 percent, and their starting salary jumped 32 percent compared with 2020.

The ultimate goal of the talent revolution is to help JXCFS transform from a talent supplier into a key node in boosting regional innovation systems, said Yan Bin, Party secretary of the college.

Zhu said: "By 2027, the Tiangong College Alliance aims to establish itself as a globally influential brand in vocational education going global, contributing more Jiangxi solutions to the Belt and Road Initiative."

Zhou Wei contributed to this story.