Highlights from news conference with education minister

Rankings of Chinese universities The rankings of Chinese universities have moved up as a whole in the past decade, which means the quality of China’s higher education has become competitive enough to rival other countries. The 2018 Asia University Rankings released by Times Higher Education included 101 Chinese universities, up from 87 last year. However, such rankings can only be used as references, and we don’t need to care too much about the rankings. They simply provide an angle for observing and analyzing the development of China’s higher education. Cultivating professionals China should innovate its talent cultivation model to meet the requirements of the new era, an information-based and globalized era with a new technological revolution. Artificial intelligence has attracted much attention recently. It requires us to reform how we cultivate professionals and make the model more market-oriented and futureoriented, so that these professionals can shoulder the responsibility of realizing the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. Regulating the education market The main focus is to regulate all kinds of afterschool training institutions. They are a necessary supplement to the education system, yet we still need to regulate institutions that teach beyond the syllabus or without qualifications. Teachers should remain faithful to the syllabus and not lure or coerce students to attend extra classes. Cooperation with overseas institutes China has built more than 2,600 institutes through overseas cooperation, among which 1,324 institutes belong to the highereducation level. Through such cooperation, we aim to enable Chinese students to enjoy high-quality overseas education on their doorstep. Teachers who are working in these institutes can learn from each other’s merits and cultivate talent valuable to all sides. The country will also step up its efforts to build more education institutes overseas.