Dai Bin | Do a good job in social education and build a new pattern of study tour

On October 25, the China Study Tour Development Report·Shaoxing Release Event hosted by our institute was held in Shaoxing City, Zhejiang Province. Dean Dai Bin delivered a keynote speech entitled "Doing a good job in social education and building a new pattern of study tour". The full text is shared as follows:

01

Study tour has become a social education movement with primary and secondary school students as the focus, teenagers as the main body, and widespread participation of the people

Study tour is an important path for social education of young people, especially primary and secondary school students, and is also an organic part of the national lifelong education system. In the process of learning and growing up of primary and secondary school students, whether it is the acquisition of scientific, humanistic and artistic knowledge, the improvement of cross-cultural communication and social interaction skills, or the establishment of values ​​and social personality, family, society and nature have played a more important role than standardized education, or at least an equally important role, and are playing an increasingly important role. Tourism is a way of life, a way of learning, and a way of growth. The scenery, scenes, events, people and memories that primary and secondary school students and young people appreciate during travel will accompany their growth throughout their lives. Whether studying at school, on weekends, during winter and summer vacations, or after graduation, everyone is using their lifetime to understand nature and integrate into society. From this point of view, study tour is not only a beneficial supplement to school education, but also a more important way of social education. From a global perspective, whether it is Japan's school trips or organized summer schools, summer camps, winter camps and other study tours in Europe and the United States, they are not only a useful supplement to standardized education, but also become a business card for the country's foreign exchanges by attracting the participation of overseas students. Russia, which is famous for its camp education, has made national camps such as Kitty Hawk, Ocean, and Artek, which occupy the top resources in Russia, into a platform for global youth cultural exchange and civilization identification, and an important stage for displaying cultural traditions and national image. Since 11 ministries and commissions jointly issued the "Opinions on Promoting Study Tours for Primary and Secondary School Students" (hereinafter referred to as the "Opinions") in 2016, study tours or study tours (hereinafter collectively referred to as "study tours") have rapidly become a tourism market segment and social education activity with a significant growth rate. The cognition of primary and secondary school students, parents and schools on study tours has also shifted from specific types of tourism products to in-depth experience of social education and quality improvement projects. With the joint efforts of departments such as culture, tourism, education, science and technology, and ocean, mass organizations such as the Communist Youth League, Women's Federation, and trade unions, and market players such as travel agencies, teaching and training companies, and study camps, study tourism further presents the characteristics of curriculum systematization, knowledge genealogy, and branding of study service entities.

With the joint efforts of the government and the market, my country has become a major country in the world in terms of study tours. Before 2016, study tours were mainly overseas study tours and winter and summer camps for primary and secondary school students from high-income families. There was no clear product concept, no clear competent department, and no scale. The "Opinions" issued in 2016 included study tours in the education and teaching plans of primary and secondary schools. The study tour demand of more than 200 million students in school was fully released, and study tours entered the fast lane of development. "Release demand - expand supply - standardize order" is both the policy logic of study tours and the realistic basis for market evolution. Since 2016, the National Welfare Lottery Public Welfare Fund has invested nearly 5 billion yuan to support the construction of study bases (camps) across the country. As of June 2024, the Ministry of Education has approved 581 national-level study practice education bases and 40 study practice education camps for primary and secondary school students, and the number of local study bases (camps) and practice education bases (camps) has also increased significantly. Public cultural venues such as museums, art galleries, science and technology museums at all levels and types have also developed relevant courses for study groups, and have organized to receive study teams from all over the country, initially forming a study base (camp) system with multi-level structure and multi-content dimensions from national to local, from science to nature, from humanities to society.

Where there is demand, there is supply. With the trend of individual travel and free travel in the domestic tourism market, traditional travel agencies with teams, routes, tour guides and packages as their main features quickly discovered this emerging market and became professional operators of research and study activities for primary and secondary school students with their operational efficiency and service quality. From 2016 to date, the number of market entities whose names include research and study or whose business scope covers research and study travel business has reached more than 30,000. Some travel agencies have completely transformed into research and study tourism service providers, and more travel agencies have opened independent research and study departments to cultivate safe, reliable, efficient and high-quality research and study service brands for schools, parents and primary and secondary school students. In the process of professional services and market operations, travel agencies such as China Travel Service, Guangzhi Travel, Yuanhai International, Wuhan Xuezhi Wuda, and Beijing Yanji have formed a number of reception standards and accumulated rich market experience. These companies engaged in research and study tourism services have formed a good interactive model with schools and teachers, which effectively transforms the cultural, educational and tourism resources of the destination into research and study tourism courses, forming a cross-border and cross-departmental cooperation structure for research and study tourism with unique Chinese characteristics.

In the process of rapid development, study tours have also encountered "growing pains", including travel without learning and learning without travel at the product level, personal safety and cultural safety in the organizational process, as well as lack of consensus and fragmentation at the institutional level. Compared with the nearly 200 years of camp education in the United States, more than 130 years of school travel in Japan, and natural education evolved from long-term school education in Finland, the development of study tours in my country has been very short, and it has only initially solved the problem of "whether there is or not", and has not yet formed a unified public cognition and broad social consensus, and has not yet reached the ideal state of unity of social and economic benefits, coordination between the government and the market, and satisfaction of parents, students and society. Coupled with the functionalization of study tours on the supply side, the commercialization of study tours and study tours on the demand side, and the safety problems that occur from time to time, the society generally has a deep love and a strong sense of responsibility for the development of study tours. Some schools link whether to participate in study tours and what type of study tours to participate in with individual scores and comprehensive evaluations, and some companies have low quality study tours due to insufficient professional capabilities. If not handled properly, the rapidly growing study tour development process is likely to stagnate or even regress. It should also be noted that compared with developed countries, there is still a large gap in the per capita income and family cultural, educational, travel and entertainment expenditures of Chinese residents. For most families, there is still a certain pressure to pay the expensive study tour fees for primary and secondary school students, resulting in the fact that the source of domestic study tour customers is still mainly concentrated in first-tier cities. From a global perspective, my country's young people have already shown an obvious "deficit" in exchanges with overseas young people. How to get more international young people to visit and communicate, and understand a real, three-dimensional and comprehensive China, is a question that must be answered and answered well for the high-quality development of study tours.

02

Adhere to the orientation of publicness and equality, and make multi-dimensional efforts by the government, the market and society to improve the supply system of study tours

Concept popularization and value recognition are the prerequisites for the sustainable development of study tours, and social consensus is the driving force for the innovative development of study tours. Study tours run through the entire life cycle from preschool education to elderly education, and are an important way to improve the quality of the nation. Through study tours, not only should young people verify the book knowledge learned in the classroom, but also conditions should be created for primary and secondary school students to appreciate the beauty of nature, comprehend the beauty of culture, and enhance their ability to interact with groups from different regions, different nationalities, and different cultural backgrounds. Only by grasping the development of study tours from a national strategic height and fully recognizing the importance of study tours for the all-round development of young people and for building a national lifelong education system can we truly avoid "departments competing for power, institutions competing for fame, and enterprises pursuing profits", and let study tours return to social development orientation and career attributes. Since the release of the "Opinions", the implementation of the situation varies greatly across the country. In areas where the progress is faster, the proportion of students' study tours can reach more than 85%, and in areas where the progress is slower, it is even only below 10%. Many schools have never implemented study tour activities so far. The most fundamental reason is the cognitive problem of parents, schools and education departments. Study tours are not just a market and industry, and cannot be simply treated as a business; nor are they just an extension of classroom education, and the classroom cannot be simply moved outside the campus. The "Opinions" must be issued, and their implementation must be supervised on the basis of evaluation and investigation to stimulate the enthusiasm of education departments to participate in and organize study tours. While stabilizing the basic population of primary and secondary school students, the central and local governments must also steadily expand the participants of study tours to preschool children, college students, adults, and the elderly, and then cover people throughout the life cycle, forming a lifelong education system in which preschool education, basic education, vocational education, higher education, and growth education complement and support each other, so that everyone can achieve the growth goal of "scholarly research and travel for the country and the world."

Build a number of national camps for children and teenagers to form a key project support for study tours in the new era. National camps are not national camps that are oriented to obtain financial subsidies, but are planned and built by the central government. They are an essential part of the national education system that carries the will of the state. They are social education institutions that are oriented to nurture the cultural confidence of young people and enhance the scientific quality and social interaction ability of the people. In the process of specific implementation, it is not appropriate to follow the traditional model of the state issuing policies, departments issuing standards, and local creation and application. Instead, the propaganda department should take the lead, and the finance, development and reform, land and resources, environmental protection, education, science and technology, the Communist Youth League, and culture and tourism departments should participate in planning and layout and site selection from the perspective of building a socialist cultural power. The site selection range of national camps can be archaeological site parks, national key cultural relics protection units, nature reserves, patriotism education bases, key areas where culture, art, education and technology gather, or urban spaces such as the Macao Special Administrative Region.

Cultivate a group of study cities for the healthy growth of young people and the exchange and mutual learning of civilizations. Whether from the perspective of tourist source areas, tourist distribution centers, or tourist destinations, cities have become the basic market and key support for study tours with their developed economic and social development levels, complete infrastructure and public services, as well as capital, technology and human resources. Relying on the travel needs of urban customers and the inherent advantages of study supply, and relying on the economic and social development achievements of cities, cultivate a group of study tour destination cities with profound cultural heritage and rich scientific and technological education resources. Study cities cannot be declared, created and accepted entirely in accordance with quantitative standards, but on the basis of respecting their inherent evolutionary logic and supporting elements, they are guided through demonstration cities. High-frequency local study can not only provide basic customer sources and frequency guarantees for camps, but also encourage camps to polish products and services and prepare to serve foreign customers.

Cultivate a number of national study and tourism routes for different age groups and for learning and traveling. The five national cultural parks of the Great Wall, the Grand Canal, the Long March, the Yellow River, and the Yangtze River and the cities and villages along them contain the genetic code of excellent traditional culture, the spiritual spectrum of red revolutionary culture, and the spatial carrier of advanced socialist culture. They are also tourist routes that practice the concept of national education and lifelong learning. With the four seasons of the year, seven public holidays, and the twenty-four solar terms as the time axis, the five national cultural parks as the spatial axis, the national camp as the fulcrum, and the study and tourism cities as the support, a national study and tourism route with interlaced time and space is formed. The 1.1 million square kilometers of "most beautiful land" involves more than 700 existing nature reserves, 10 world natural heritages, two world cultural and natural dual heritages, and 19 world man and biosphere reserves. Traveling along the national parks and incorporating scientific investigations and field surveys into them is undoubtedly of unique value and extremely important significance for building a lifelong learning system with Chinese characteristics.

Vigorously develop inbound research and study, and cultivate a destination for world youth research and study exchanges. With the changes in the global political and economic situation and the international trade landscape, overseas young people have an increasing demand for understanding Chinese culture, learning Chinese, studying abroad, etc. Students in Chinese schools and children of overseas Chinese have a strong desire to find their roots. Students in bilingual schools and foreign students who pay attention to China's development have a real need to understand Chinese culture and make field visits. Whether in terms of quantity, quality or leadership, the international youth group is a highly growth-oriented and strategic market. Different countries have different semester systems and holiday times, which is conducive to forming a better staggered travel and a stable market sequence, and is conducive to smoothing the off-season effect of the domestic market. We should accelerate the survey of visa and endorsement needs for foreign students, children of overseas Chinese, school group exchanges, teacher visits, etc., and implement special visa, port and payment facilitation policies. We must innovate the external publicity model of inbound research and study. The CCTV documentary "Traveling with Books" and the "Great Chinese Culture" series of real-life courses jointly developed by the Central United Front Work Department and the Chinese Language Education Foundation of China have received good responses overseas and have become important channels and bases for international youth to understand China and choose study cities. More foreign youth will be introduced to China through international competition invitations, winter and summer camps, inter-school visits, and friendly city exchanges. Hong Kong and Macao will be included in the planning of the national study routes in the Greater Bay Area, and the construction of national study camps in the Macao Special Administrative Region will be supported. There will be mutual recognition of study tourism bases, study tourism instructors, study tourism courses, and service standards.

03

Accelerate the formation of a new pattern of research and study tourism with high-level promotion, central and local coordination, and government-enterprise cooperation

First, strengthen the Party's overall leadership over study and tourism and social education, incorporate study and tourism into relevant coordination and deliberation mechanisms, clarify the leading, main responsible and coordinated departments, improve the construction, operation and supervision work mechanism, and build a new pattern of study and tourism work in the new era. As soon as possible, issue the "Opinions on Promoting the High-quality Development of Study and Tourism" in the name of the General Office of the CPC Central Committee, the Central Propaganda Department and the State Council to adapt to the development needs of the new situation, and clarify the guiding ideology, development goals, work tasks, departmental responsibilities and conditions for the development of study and tourism in the new era. Form a new pattern of study and tourism with the publicity department in charge and the participation of departments such as culture, cultural relics and tourism, education, science and technology, land, forestry and grassland, environment, finance and development, give full play to the role of mass organizations such as the Science and Technology Association, the Federation of Literary and Art Circles, the Communist Youth League, the Women's Federation, and the Trade Union, and form a new pattern of high-quality development of study and tourism with extensive participation from all walks of life. Focus on improving the coverage of study and tourism and the participation rate of key groups, so that primary and secondary school students in more regions can participate. Timely introduce the "Spring Vacation" and "Autumn Vacation" systems for primary and secondary schools to release more and more flexible education time, encourage students to use holidays to stagger study and tourism activities, and reduce the concentrated run on popular resources.

Second, to adapt to the new development needs of study tourism, further improve the supervision system and improve the supervision mechanism. Timely issue standards for study courses, study routes, tourism services and study tourism bases, and publish national and local study camp construction specifications. Strengthen the supervision, cultivation and guidance of study tourism market entities, and form a full coverage of supervision from education entities, study groups to market entities. Resolutely adhere to the ideological red line, ensure cultural security, and continuously improve the quality of curriculum development and tourism services. Relying on tourism and education institutions, cultivate a group of new compound talents with scientific knowledge and humanistic qualities, and the ability to design courses and control services. Commercial organizations should not be allowed to dominate study tourism, let alone make improper profits by taking advantage of the name of volunteers to teach in ethnic minority areas, old revolutionary areas, and border areas. Set entry thresholds and exit mechanisms for travel agents who mainly serve primary and secondary school students, especially study tourism instructors, full-time team leaders, and study camp administrators.

Third, we should insist on the state's affairs being handled by the state, include national camps for study and tourism in the scope of financial and land guarantee, and encourage regions with conditions to build local camps for study and tourism. Research and publish the construction plan of national camps and the construction guidelines for local camps as soon as possible. Relying on relatively mature camps such as Oriental Land, International Camps for Study and Tourism of Excellent Traditional Chinese Culture, and Lanting, we will form demonstration camps on the basis of investment and expansion, and build 10-15 national camps during the "15th Five-Year Plan" period. Culture and Tourism will work with education, science and technology, development and reform, land and other departments to strengthen the construction guidance of local camps for study and tourism, and identify a number of high-quality camps for study and tourism. After the construction of hardware facilities such as camps and bases is basically completed, the support of the National Lottery Fund can be turned to soft construction such as content, curriculum, and human capital improvement. It can also guide private museums, art galleries, science and technology enterprises, local public resources, etc. to provide study and research space through incentives such as subsidies to supplement the insufficient supply of study and research content in science and technology, psychology, sports, and art in my country. Relying on the idle school buildings caused by the shrinking student population in rural areas, we will guide the source cities to build a number of city-based youth study and research camps through small-scale investment and professional transformation.

Author | Dai Bin Editor | Liu Xin Source | China Tourism Academy (Data Center of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism) Please indicate the author and source for reprinting