International exchange and cooperation have always been an important part of higher vocational education, which is also crucial to the future development of higher vocational colleges [1]. There has been great progress in the last 20 years of Sino-foreign cooperation in running schools in higher vocational colleges. Despite of the achievements being made, many problems still remain to be solved, including the poor quality of students, whose English skills are not good enough to complete all the professional courses; the lack of teacher resources, who could perform bilingual teaching; as well as the teaching operation, management system, supervision mechanism, quality evaluation system which could not adapt and meet the essential requirements of the Sino-foreign cooperation in running schools [2-9]. From the beginning of cooperation between Nanjing Polytechnic Institute and Dawson College from Canada until now, although common problems exist as in other colleges, the effectiveness of cooperation has been further deepened and expanded. Also, the impact of international exchanges and cooperation on the education and teaching has been better executed, the development of connotation has been continuously promoted and the radiation effect has constantly been extended. Up to now, there have been a total of 5 sessions of students graduated from Sino-Canada Mechanical Engineering Joint Program of NJPI.
1 Overview of the Joint program
Under the approval of the Jiangsu Provincial Department of education, and then examined, approved and kept on record by the Ministry of education, a 3-year Numerical Control (Mechanical Engineering Technology) junior college degree international joint program run between Nanjing Polytechnic Institute from Nanjing, Jiangsu, China and Dawson College from Montreal, Quebec, Canada, started from 2009. The program has renewed the cooperative agreement in 2013, which is also under the approval of the Jiangsu Provincial Department of education, and then examined, approved and kept on a record by the Ministry of education. Graduates, who completed all the courses specified in the training plan which was written by Nanjing Polytechnic and Dawson College, and whose qualifications and credits have been examined and approved by both the colleges, will be awarded the Chinese Academy of Higher Education Certificate (Chinese Diploma), as well as a Canadian college diploma or certificate. Since 2009, there have been 6 sessions of students enrolled in this joint program, which has 154 students in total. Among them, 138 students from 5 sessions have graduated, with 124 students obtaining the Chinese graduation certificate, and 99 students obtaining the Canadian diploma. All the 138 students got the Chinese vocational qualification certificate.
2 Effectiveness of cooperation
2.1 The enhancement of connotation of the joint program
A total of 33 courses were offered in this joint program, in which 11 courses were introduced from Canada (a percentage of 33.33), 2 courses were developed by both sides of the colleges, and the other 20 courses were taught by the Chinese side via bilingual teaching.
With the gradual promotion of the joint program, international education idea, the teacher quality and teaching methods, which we adapted to match the pace of Canadian teaching, have been constantly forming, growing, maturing. During this process, the students gained the international standard professional ability and were able to communicate effectively with foreign people. The students can also work independently and innovatively in a competitive environment, and the independence of the competitive power of and modernization team cooperation ability of the students from the joint program have been developed.
1、 Innovation of education concept of exchange, mutual fusion, mutual assistance, complementary between China and foreign countries
Based on learning and referencing the characteristic of relative openness of foreign teaching ideas, we fully transformed the educational concept, overcome the bottleneck of the relative lag of the existing hardware construction, and paid more attention to the training of students’ initiative on solving problems. Furthermore, we cultivated students’ practical ability in a more effective way relying on the support from the hardware facilities.
2、Establishment of teachers group focused on their own practical ability and the development of the comprehensive quality
Through the communication and cooperation with the teachers from Canada, we gradually understand the reason why they have deeper understanding about the professional theory based on the skillful practical experiences. That is because the teachers from Dawson College have already had many years’ working experiences before they become a teacher [10]. As a lesson, the teachers from the Numerical Control major, strive for any opportunities to enter into the enterprise, accumulate the practical experience, and then put them into use of setting up projects, planning of the teaching contents, which are closer to the actual production. On the other hand, with the improvement of the English level of the teachers, which enables them to understand foreign advanced technology and theory extensively and deeply, more and more frontier knowledge of Numerical Control specialty has been introduced to the students, and more and more advanced design and processing technology from abroad has been introduced to the classroom, which greatly improves the learning enthusiasm of the students.
3、Formation of teaching method "taking the student as the center" and the organic integration of the internationalization and localization
Similar to the teaching philosophy of project-based teaching method our college advocated, teaching methods from Canadian side was always in accordance with the dominant position of students. The teaching program is set up from life, or from the production, which provides students with more opportunities and creativity. In view of the fact of Canada’s emphasizing on process, students’ interest and training of the ability to accomplish open projects, our original teaching method has been improved.
4、Significant improvement in students' attainment.
The students' literacy has been significantly improved, after educational philosophy, teacher qualifications, and teaching methods being integrated in essence with international standards.
2.2 Radiation Effect of the joint program
Sino-Canada cooperation in running school, not only achieves significant effectiveness in the improvement of connotation, but also led to a breakthrough progress in skills competition, and the other majors’ development with the help from the strong educational resources of Canada.
1、Successfully holding of two sessions of the NC skills competition
First and second Sino-Canada NC Skills Competition was held in NJPI respectively from June 11th to June 13th in 2013 and from June 10th to 12th in 2015. The competitions were jointly organized by the Chinese Association of Chemical Education, Department of Education Steering Committee on Petroleum and Chemical Professional Education and undertook by Dawson College from Canada and NJPI from China.
2、Richly boost the establishment of “Five multiples" teaching quality guarantee and monitoring system (that is, "multi-party participation, multi-level standard, multi-element evaluation, multi-measures implemented and multi-ways promoted) The system introduced more internationalized vision and elements in the aspects of main body of construction, evaluation system, specific measures, in order to enhance the level of internationalization of running school in an open idea.
3、Promote the gradual improvement of the NJCP talent training mode (that is take “Numerical” as the background, take “Joint Program” as the base, take “Competence” as the core, take “Practice” as the mainline）, further deepening the cooperation between colleges and enterprises (Nanhua mechanical factory).
4、Radiation effects on the general majors
（1）Drive breakthrough progress of general majors
In 2014, the major of Chemical Equipment Technology, which is mainly supported by the major of NC Technology, became a national key construction majors (group). In 2015, it won the title of “Brand Major of Jiangsu Province”.
（2）Drive the feasibility of developing a bilingual teaching in general majors（take the course《Plastic Mold Design》as an example）
In order to cultivate mold talents with international vision and international competitiveness [11,12]., in the fall semester of 2013, a professional teacher from the major of mold, apply for the bilingual teaching of 《Plastic Mold Design》, which is the core course of the major of mold design and manufacture, after 2-year of continues accumulation. Taking the students’ English level into account, during the whole teaching process, the “three steps” teaching implementation plan was used.
（3）Drive the reform mode of general majors innovatively and Systematically (take the major of mold design and manufacturing as an example)
How to make teaching be in line with the actual production was fully realized during working with the foreign teachers from Canada. After constant adjustment, eventually, the competency based courses system” close to the production process” and the practice teaching system “integrated, multi-level” illustrated was formed.
3 Direction of future development
1、Optimize the content of bilingual teaching.
2、Strengthen the standardized construction of bilingual teaching.
3、Expand the network (thematic network of “o2o online and offline” jointly built by our college and Dawson college) of teaching platform.
4、Secure more funding and policy input.
5、Improve the outcomes gained by education.
6、Promote the exchange of professional skills between China and Canada.
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基金：江苏高校品牌建设工程一期项目(PPZY2015C232);2015年江苏省教育教改研究项目；2015年南京科技职业学院人文社科课题（课题编号:NJCC-2015-ZD-03);2014年南京科技职业学院人文社科课题（课题编号：NJCC-2014-ZD-04)
