Visitors from country's remote regions learn by example in district programs
For a long time, Jiading has been aiding development in some remote areas with funding and support for industry and talent. These days, it also welcomes people from these remote areas to study and work in the district.
Learning while working
Yang Xiang from the Chuxiong Yi Autonomous Prefecture in Yunnan Province works at Yesun (Shanghai) Mould Co in Jiading District.
Yang Xiang, Shi Shaohong and Luo Hua are three young men from the Chuxiong Yi Autonomous Prefecture in Yunnan Province. They now work at Jiading-based Yesun (Shanghai) Mould Co for around 4,500 yuan (US$650) a month.
Yang’s father is a tobacco farmer in Chuxiong who has earned just 6,000 yuan a year due to bad weather in recent years. He also has 50,000 yuan in bank loans.
Shi’s mother suffers from kidney disease. He and his elder brother are working hard to raise money for her treatment.
Luo gave up on college despite a high score in the entrance exam. His younger brother is still in school and the family is poor. Luo’s mother is dead and his father is working in Kunming, Yunnan’s capital.
Luo’s 62-year-old grandmother stays at home and Luo, a bookworm and amateur journalist, wants to take her out of the mountains and travel around. He will use his camera to record their happy moments.
All three are still learning while they are working. They have one day off a week and their employer provides them with accommodation and some daily necessities.
The molding company has mapped out a plan for them. If they meet requirements in three months, they will become full-time workers and be paid up to 6,000 yuan a month.
If they eventually become senior technicians, their salary will increased to 7,000 yuan. “If they learn well here, it will not be a problem for them to find a job in the same industry,” said Dong Zhenlin, head of the company’s administration department.
Finding the answer to poverty
Zhang Junguo (right), deputy director of the United Front Work Department of the Communist Party of China’s Chuxiong committee, takes part in the Jiading session of a citywide exhibition of products from remote areas that Shanghai supports.
It is less than two months since Zhang Junguo returned to Chuxiong. He often thinks of the people he met and things that happened in Jiading. As part of a 6-month exchange program, Zhang found out about the various differences in economic, social and cultural development between the two places, giving him the impetus for future work.
Before coming to Jiading, Zhang often wondered how to turn Chuxiong’s green mountains into “gold and silver mines.” He came to Jiading to find the answer.
Zhang is deputy director of the United Front Work Department of the Communist Party of China’s Chuxiong committee. When he studied and worked in Jiading, he was deputy director of the Division for Ethnic Minorities and Religious Affairs under the CPC Jiading committee’s United Front Work Department.
Poverty alleviation is the No. 1 challenge in Yunnan. The exchange let Zhang realize that “there is no poor environment but poor management.”
He adopted some institutional innovations practiced in Jiading after returning home.
Zhang copied Jiading’s incubation system for social stratification and established a branch of Chuxiong Intellectual Association to recruit likely candidates.
After visiting several agricultural parks in Jiading, he learned that some aspects of Chuxiong’s rural revitalization strategy lagged behind. In his opinion, industrial development, population distribution, public services, land use and ecological protection should be considered as a whole.
He also suggested building a planning system of urban-rural integration, regional integration and unified rules.
Zhang took part in the Jiading session of a citywide exhibition of products from remote areas that Shanghai supports. After that, Zhang understood that money was not the key, but people’s efforts to market their products at home and abroad were.
Glad to be on right track
Wang Xingchao (left), stomatologist in Jiuzhi County, Qinghai Province, practices at Jiading Central Hospital.
Wang Xingchao still remembers his first day at Jiading Central Hospital and its department of stomatology. It treated more than 200 patients that day.
Never before had he seen such advanced equipment, including a scanner specifically developed for 3D imaging of the teeth and jaws and disinfectors.
Wang, 27, is the only stomatologist in Jiuzhi County, Qinghai Province. He also worked as nurse and cleaner in the stomatology department of the county’s people’s hospital.
Disinfection takes up much of his time as he has to steam the medical tools himself. In Jiading, the skills of his peers in using the equipment are the most advanced.
Wang was glad to find that he was on the right track. Zhang Zhimin, director of the department of stomatology at Jiading Central Hospital, is Wang’s teacher and familiar with medical care development in Qinghai.
Zhang taught Wang everything from physical examination to medical tools disinfection.
Every day when Wang returned to his residence, he would organize the notes he had taken and the next day would ask colleagues about anything he didn’t quite understand.
“Time is not enough every day,” Wang said.
Never too late to learn
Hua Jie (right), dean of the Golog Institute of Vocational Technology in Qinghai Province, attends a class at Shanghai Dazhong Technical School in Jiading on an staff exchange program between the two schools.
Three months was too short a time for Hua Jie who came from Qinghai as part of an exchange program. “Everything here, from the planning, internship program, teaching method to teacher cultivation, Party building and student management, is worth learning,” said Hua. “I wish I could stay here for another three months.”
Hua has been a teacher for more than 30 years in the Golog Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture.
“I will take everything I learned here to home,” he said.
Hua is a Tibetan and dean of the Golog Institute of Vocational Technology. He planned to take the teaching and management experience he learned in Jiading to Golog.
Jiading-based Shanghai Dazhong Technical School customized a plan for him, from planning and management to teaching practice and then Party building which meant a busy three months.
The Dazhong school is focusing on cultivating craftsmen. “We should do the same,” said Hua.
“Both schools have auto repair programs. Their teaching experience in this major is worth learning from.”
Hua attended almost every class in the school and the school authorities made every effort to meet his demands. “I’ll improve the quality of teaching and management after returning home,” said Hua, confidently.
