Complex Adaptive Systems and Operational Mechanisms of University‒Enterprise Cooperation in the Cultivation of Outstanding Engineers

Abstract

National institutes of outstanding engineers serve as an innovative platform for the cultivation of outstanding engineers and play a crucial role in building a new workforce. To elucidate the complex characteristics and operational mechanisms of the outstanding engineer cultivation system, a structured multi-case study was conducted on four national institutes of outstanding engineers. The analysis revealed that China’s outstanding engineer cultivation system exhibited complex characteristics of aggregation, diversity, flows, and nonlinearity. Higher education institutions (HEIs) and enterprises implemented self-adaptive internal reforms to adapt to external environmental stimuli, including interdisciplinary curriculum reforms, the establishment of authentic training, practice, and internship systems, and expanded investments in university‒enterprise cooperation. They constructed innovative and standardized structures, including the whole-process collaboration and consultation system for talent cultivation, the university‒enterprise supervisor group collaboration mechanism, and the education model driven by industrial research projects. This study proposes a series of optimization paths from conceptual consensus, resource sharing, and joint construction by agents to achieve high-quality construction and operation of national institutes of outstanding engineers.

Keywords

outstanding engineers / university‒enterprise cooperation / national institute of outstanding engineers / complex adaptive system

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