Discussion on How to Cultivate Interdisciplinary Graduate Students
Yan Liu, Lu-quan Ren
Key Laboratory for Bionic Engineering, Ministry of Education, Jilin University, Changchun, China
liuyan2000@jlu.edu.cn
Abstract - Education of interdisciplinary student has
become an important project of modern universities
education reforms, which is an effective way to cultivate high
quality and innovative students. In this paper, the situations
both at home and abroad education of interdisciplinary
students are summarized. Furthermore, the four basic
qualifications of cultivating interdisciplinary graduate
students are proposed, and also students’ cultivation of the
bionic engineering interdiscipline is discussed in Jilin
University of China.
Keywords
universities
interdiscipline, graduate student
education
disciplines. At present, interdisciplines have different
formations in Universities such as two or more disciplines
intercrossing between natural science and social science
and from natural science or social science. The
interdisciplinary education is relied on development of
interdisciplines. The interdisciplinary education has
become an effective way to cultivate innovative students.
Furthermore, how to reform becomes an important project
both at home and abroad.
reform,
I. INTRODUCTION
Universities undertake the task of cultivating high
quality and innovative students, and also it is an important
project that how to cultivate the high quality and
innovative students. All kinds of natural phenomena
compose an associated integrity. Therefore, the human’s
understandings about nature have the integral character [1].
With the development of science and technology,
multidisciplinary research became more and more
important because interdisciplinary research is propitious
to indicate natural truth. Furthermore, education of
interdisciplinary students is the inevitable tendency of
cultivating high quality and innovative students.[2]
II. UNDERSTANDING OF INTERDISCIPLINE AND
EDUCATION OF INTERDISCIPLINARY STUDENTS
At present, there is not a specific concept about
interdiscipline. In generally, the concept means
communication and cooperation of different disciplines.
Since the 20th century, many scientific frontier problems
and many complex issues have gotten breakthroughs due
to cooperation of different disciplines’ scientist.
Therefore, interdisciplines are made progress and some
new interdisciplines are set up after many universities
renew discipline arrangement and break restrictions of
original disciplines.
Mr. Qian Xuesen had made an authority definition
about interdiscipline in his early age; he pointed
“interdiscipline refers to be generated a series of new
disciplines in the intersectant areas of natural science and
social science”. With the development of science and
technology this definition apparently can not cover the
signification of interdisciplines. The writer thinks that
interdisciplines are a different expression form from
traditional disciplines. They all can be called
interdiscipline, which intercross two or more traditional
III. SITUATION BOTH AT HOME AND ABROAD OF
INTERDISCIPLINARY EDUCATION
A. Origin of disciplinary education
Interdisciplines can break barriers of disciplines and
enlarge understanding to science, which can meet the
needs of development including the science and
engineering technology. Therefore, interdisciplines show
unique advantages not only in disciplines’ construction
but also in cultivating innovative students. In the United
States, interdisciplinary education was called “general
education” had developed after world war Ⅱ.From the
Second World War to the 1960s, the typical representative
of interdisciplines education is “future change course”,
which was designed and developed by Boyer. From the
1970s to the present, the significance of interdisciplinary
education gradually was revealed and went into the
quickly growth period. Moreover, education scholars
wrote monographs about it and founded academic
organizations .Klein’s monograph mentioned “The strong
knowledge and education value of interdisciplines made it
become an important theme of modern education reform
[3] [4]
”.
B
Disciplinary education in abroad
The new course catalogue in the Unite States, the
ratio of “interdisciplines” and “multidisciplines” is 7% of
the whole group [5][6]. Interdisciplines are added into
teaching plan in University of Tsukuba of Japan, at same
time, interdisciplinary researches are strengthened.
Education reform is set up in some Britain’s universities
and course contents and teaching methods are different
from before. Main measures include that discipline areas
are expanded, narrow disciplines are repealed and
interdisciplinary courses are set up .For example two or
more subjects are put into a major (like economics and
engineering) in Oxford University.
C
Disciplinary education at home
Interdisciplinary Education is an important aspect of
universities education reform in China. Some reform
measures have been taken in Beijing University, Tsinghua
University, Fudan University and other universities to
cultivate interdisciplinary students such as a double
degree system, setting up elective courses, allowing
students to turn major and constructing majors with
interdisciplinary characteristics. Since the 1980s,
interdisciplinary students training practices have been set
up such as intercrossing machine and materials in Jilin
University of Technology. Since the 1990s, the liberal art
base class and science base class have been set up in
Beijing University and Fudan University, the liberal art
base class including literature, history and philosophy
subjects; the science base class including physics,
chemistry and biology subjects. [7]
There is a unique advantage in interdisciplinary
education and cultivating interdisciplinary students in
Jilin University. Six Universities are combined into new
Jilin University, which is the largest scale University of
the China and has a complete range of disciplines
covering all 12 major disciplines categories including
philosophy, economics, law, education, literature, history,
science, technology, agriculture, medicine, management
and military. It is paid much attention in Jilin University
that how to cultivate students of Interdisciplines, for
example four categories of elective courses are set up and
students are demanded must to select more than 8 credits.
In the April of 2005, the file “some opinions on
strengthening teaching work and constantly improving the
teaching quality” is promulgated, clearly pointed out that
“according to the needs of the development of economy
and society the advantages of multidisciplines should be
play attention and set up several new majors of
interdisciplines and second bachelor degree. Moreover,
teaching mode reforms should be carried out such as
setting up ‘liberal art class’, ‘big science class’,
‘multidiscipline class’ and interdisciplines of liberal art
and natural science; carrying out the elastic credit system,
breaking through the barriers of departments and majors
and encouraging students to select courses from others
departments”.
Therefore,
the
cultivation
of
interdisciplinary students has become one of main goals
in the education reforms in Jilin University.
IV. BASIC QUALIFICATIONS OF CULTIVATING
INTERDISCIPLINES GRADUATE STUDENTS
Most of interdisciplines are new disciplines, which
generally represent the development direction of the new
knowledge and technology. The development of
interdisciplines have their own internal rules, so they are
some different from traditional discipline in cultivating
students. According to characters of interdisciplines and
mode of students training, we can find that it should be
followed some basic qualifications to cultivate innovative
students.
A. Scientific and Clear Direction of Discipline
Discipline direction is the premise of the existence
of discipline and is the fundamental problem to decide the
discipline’s development. Traditional discipline has
generally good development foundation and more mature
development
direction.
The
establishment
of
interdisciplines usually arises at the historic moment,
generally in order to adapt to the needs of the development
of science, or engineering and or social life .Therefore,
interdisciplines must be guide for a scientific and clear
discipline direction. The scientific and clear discipline
direction is an important element that leads the students of
different disciplines background to marching along a right
direction.
B
Strongly Supportive System
Interdisciplines inevitably involve two or more
disciplines. Generally ,the traditional discipline have good
supportive conditions .But the development of new
interdiscipline need more powerful support such as having
their own the necessary facilities ,equipments and their
own course systems. In addition, the basic conditions are
needed which can meet the practical needs of the teachers
and students.
C
Enough High Quality Students
Choosing talents is the key element including
teachers and students. On the one hand, there need to have
a certain number of high quality teachers with different
disciplines’ background. On the other hand, there need to
have plenty of high quality students of different majors.
Practices prove that the success of interdisciplines must
be the result of the long-term cooperation between the
teachers and students of the different disciplines .The
success of the interdisciplinary graduate student training
must be the result of encouraging and attracting more
excellent students form other disciplines and majors to
register for examination and participate. Therefore, school
management sections should provide the policy support
for teachers and students from different majors and
departments.
D
Relaxed and harmonious academic atmosphere
For interdisciplinary group, either teachers or students
have different academic background and ways of thinking
respectively. People from different majors can form
thinking collision and have widely cognition and
discussion but it is not an easy thing to intercross different
subjects really. Therefore, there must be relaxed and
harmonious academic environment to listen to different
views, dare to tolerate failure and provide necessary
sufficient development space for the students with
different disciplines and different ideas.[8]
V. STUDENT CULTIVATION MODE OF BIONIC
ENGINEERING IN JILIN UNIVERSITY
Some interdisciplines such as the medical law,
zoonosis, information biology, biomedical engineering
and so on were founded in Jilin University. Bionic
engineering discipline is one successful example of the
many interdisciplines. The new teaching mode was
adopted during the process of cultivating graduate
students “according to the characteristics of
interdisciplines innovation education is put into the whole
course of the students training, which is based on leading
disciplines and considered on other disciplines [9][10].” The
measures of cultivating students are carried out.
A. Students Training Based on High Level Projects
Development of bionic engineering discipline is based
on the high level projects. The discipline is an important
part of national key discipline “Agricultural
Mechanization Engineering” and is support for
“211”project. About 60 key national and provincial
projects are undertaken such as National Basic Research
of China, national 863 projects, Natural Science
Foundation of China, the Key Projects of Ministry of
Education and so on.
Bionic engineering discipline of Jilin University has
gradually reached to the world’s advanced level in field of
terrain-machine bionics. Many well-known scholars are
cultivated such as academician of CAS, academician of
CAE, national experts with outstanding contributions, the
Yangtze River scholar, the gainers of national science
fund for distinguished young scientists, the new century
excellent talents of the Ministry of Education and so on.
Furthermore, some awards are gained such as second
prize of National Technical Invention, second prize of
National Teaching Achievement and more than 40
national, provincial and municipal Science and
Technology Awards. More than 670 papers have been
published including 220 papers for SCI index, 360 papers
for EI index and 60 patents for invention. In 2000 the Key
Laboratory for terrain-machine bionic technology (now
the key laboratory of bionic engineering) of Ministry of
Education was found.
B
Resource Support from Multi-level Bases and
Platforms
Some bases are established such as the first key
laboratory of bionic engineering of Ministry of Education,
China-British unite laboratory about function surface and
fluid interface bionic, engineering bionic laboratory of
Jilin province and so on. Furthermore, multifunctional
base has formed with scientific research, talents training,
disciplines’ construction, technological development and
product fabrication.
International cooperation platform for researchers
and graduate students are provided to academic
cooperation with international well-known universities in
bionic engineering field. The international platform of
cooperation has been formed through declaring
international cooperative projects, participating in
important international academic conferences and
selecting excellent teachers to study abroad, which keep
up with the latest progresses of the international bionic
engineering and gradually formed its own characteristics
and advantages.
In these years, more than 30 people have been sent
to Oxford University, Nottingham University and other
famous universities to research cooperatively; and more
than 20 graduate students have been sent to study for their
degrees [11]. In addition, high level academic journal is
founded to provide the better academic exchange space
and platform. In 2004, the journal named “Journal of
Bionic Engineering” was founded with the editorial board
which was constituted by international famous experts
such as academician of CAS, academicians of Indian,
members of FRS and so on, which indexed by EI in 2006
and indexed by SCI in 2007.
C Cultivating Students According to Their Aptitude
In 1988, discipline barriers were broken because the
bionics had an interdisciplinary character. Students were
chosen from other sub-disciplines or discipline even
across big disciplines such as biology, information,
geoscience and management. Moreover, across discipline
students have reached 70%.
In the course of training students original major was
considered firstly, then combined with research projects.
The students’ interests, hobbies and specialties were
considered also. The corresponding personal cultivated
plans were set up according to the students’ major,
research direction and foundation. Some method were
used such as organizing the graduate students to select
other schools’ lessons and encouraging the teachers open
interdisciplinary courses to overcome the shortages of
original teaching methods and courses.
In the process of students training, bionics education
is throughout the whole process including teaching
including scientific research, social activities and so on.
The students can be divided into different levels such as
basic research, applicable basic research and
technological development and then cultivate the students
of different level in corresponding training base. For
example, the students who have a better scientific
research foundation can enter into the Key Laboratory to
engage the basic research; the students who have
engineering foundation can enter into pilot scale test base
to engage the development of products; and the students
who have good English level can enter into China-British
Joint Laboratory to visit international communication and
cooperation.
D Building Good Academic Atmospheres
It is very important of cooperation of
internationality, interschool and in research teams to
develop bionic engineering discipline. Long-term
effective system of academic activities has been set up for
more than twenty years. Furthermore, “serious,
conscientious, harmonious” academic atmosphere is
formed based on the “innovation”. The research team’s
leader carried out various academic activities such as
expert forum, scholar lecture, and group discussion and so
on. Through cooperation with more than 10 universities or
research institutions and research together from different
discipline researchers such as machine, biology, material,
geology, management and so on bionic engineering
discipline was developed quickly. The harmonious
academic atmosphere was built and good relationship of
cooperation was keep during corporation. In the academic
activities teachers and students express academic ideas,
stimulate innovative thinking and improve research level.
VI CONCLUSION
The students cultivating mode of bionic engineering
interdiscipline has gone through more than 20 years.
Furthermore, more than one hundred of high level
interdisciplinary excellent talents were cultivated who had
important contributions in the positions of scientific
research, teaching, enterprise and management. In 2009,
the teaching research production ——“the exploration
and practice of cultivating high quality and innovative
graduate students by interdisciplinary education ” won the
second prize of sixth national teaching achievement
because of the outstanding achievements in cultivating
high quality and innovative talents of Jilin University’s
bionic engineering teaching group. The high quality
graduate students training mode’s research and practice of
engineering bionics discipline in Jilin University provide
reference for interdisciplinary education of China.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
Project supported by the Course System Construction
of High-level Graduate Students (201021010) and Key
Course Construction (20102228) in Jilin University.
REFERENCES
[1] Y. X. Lu, “Significance of Interdisciplinary Subjects and
Interdisciplinary Science,”
Bullentin of the Chinese
Academy of Science ,vol. 20 ,no. 1,pp. 58-60,2005
[2] G. Y. Liu. “Interdiscipline and education of Graduate
students”, China Higher Education , no. 18, pp .35-37,
Aug.2006
[3] G.G. Jerry, L. R. James, Handbook of the Undergraduate
Curriculum:A
Comprehensive
Guide
to
Purposes,Structures,Practices
and
Change,
San
Francisco:Jossey-Bass Publishers,1997, pp.395
[4] D. M. Wang, “Studying Review of Interdisciplinary
Subjects Education in Universities of the United States ,”
Comparative Education Research,no. 3, pp. 38-43,2007
[5] H. Y. Wang. “Enlightenment of the Development of
Interdisciplinary Subjects in American Graduate Ages,”
China Higher-education Research , no. 8, pp.40-44,2008
[6] V. B Peter, K. Luchien. “The Evolution of Management as an
Interdisciplinary Field”, Journal of Management History,
Vol. 18 No. 2, pp. 219-237, 2012
[7] Q. R. Chen, N.G. Yin, “Researching and Education of
Interdisciplinary Subjects :the Inevitable Choice for
Famous Universities in 21st Century,” Research and
Development Management , vol. 13,no. 6,pp.44-48,2011
[8] B. Hong, B. Yehuda. “Creating Learning Organizations in
Higher Education: Applying a Systems Perspective”, The
Learning Organization, Vol. 17 No. 3, pp. 228-242,2010
[9] Y. Liu ,H. Cui ,J. Q. Li ,L. Q. Ren, “Exploration of Bionics
Interdisciplinary Subjects Education’s Mode and Practice of
Teaching Method,” Journal of Huazhong Agricultural
University, vol. 24, no. S1,pp. 145-147, 2005
[10] L. Q. Ren, Y. Liu, Z. W. Han, Q. Cong, J. Q. Li,
“Researching and Practice of Newtype Interdisciplinary
Subjects’s Training talents,” China Higher Education , no.
18, pp .30, Sep.2008
[11] J. Q. Li, Y. W. Li, R. Zhang, Y. Liu. “An E-learning Model
on Biomimetics in Agricultural Engineering Education”,
Journal of Huazhong Agricultural University, vol. 24, no.
S1,pp. 6-8, 2005