China's universities are enrolling more engineering students amid intensified technological competition with the United States. — SCMP
Like millions of Chinese students, 18-year-old He Junjie is anxiously waiting to see which university and major will admit him after last month’s intensely competitive National Higher Education Entrance Examination, or gaokao.
After evaluating his score and studying the universities and programmes he qualified for, He focused on engineering when submitting his applications a few weeks ago.
Information and communications technology, as well as vehicle engineering, were the top choices, the young man from east China’s Zhejiang province said, because they “represent the direction of future industrial development”.
“Many of my classmates have also chosen majors related to new technology and engineering, because we think there’s quite a lot of demand for such talent in Hangzhou,” He said, referring to the provincial capital that is home to artificial intelligence (AI) start-up DeepSeek and humanoid robotics firm Unitree Robotics.
While international trade and urban planning were among the most popular subjects with students two decades ago, when China joined the World Trade Organization and its property market started to boom, a new wave of technology-focused academic priorities is reshaping higher education.
Engineering disciplines related to possible technological advancements have reigned supreme as China’s state-driven system funnels students into such fields amid intensified tech competition with the United States.
While interest in technology is also rising in the US, experts said interest in the technical and liberal arts was better balanced there, reflecting a flexible and market-driven system and a broader range of career paths.
“New engineering has been quite popular in recent years because it points to good employment prospects, either in terms of the number of jobs or the amount of government investment,” said Chu Zhaohui, a senior researcher at the Beijing-based China National Academy of Educational Sciences think tank.
Introduced by the Ministry of Education in 2017 and gaining traction in recent years, “new engineering” encompasses a range of interdisciplinary and emerging majors designed to align with technological advancements and industry needs. They cover fields including AI and data science, intelligent manufacturing, robotics and bioengineering.
But such preferences were often “short-sighted and utilitarian” and lacked the support of personal passion, which meant that many graduates might only be able to perform at a relatively low level, Chu warned.
Chinese students have flocked to such disciplines over the past few years as universities have accelerated adjustments of priorities.
Shanghai’s Fudan University, a top institution known for its strength in liberal arts, announced earlier this year that it would reduce the proportion of liberal arts admissions from over 30% to 20% to make more room for engineering students.
It will offer over 1,000 undergraduate admission slots in engineering this year, accounting for nearly 30% of its total enrolment plan and representing a year-on-year increase of over 20%, according to an announcement released in May.
The adjustment of university majors is a response to national strategic priorities, as Beijing emphasises technology-driven economic growth and promotes high-end manufacturing.
Over the past decade, the Ministry of Education has approved about 20,000 new undergraduate programmes covering 655 majors, with engineering majors accounting for the highest number, according to research from Huazhong University of Science and Technology that was published in March.
There had been a similar trend in the US as universities shifted their focus from diversity, equity and inclusion to employment outcomes following US President Donald Trump’s return to the White House in January, said Chen Hang, co-founder of WholeRen Group, an education consultancy based in Pittsburgh.
“This means that people are becoming more pragmatic in their choice of majors, leaning towards fields like technology, healthcare and education,” he said.
Chen gave the example of the University of California, a leading public research university, where its computer science master’s programme has an enrolment quota of 500 students but received 7,000 applications. In contrast, other programmes at the university had vacancies, he said, citing its president.
But social science degrees were still popular in the US because they were relatively easier to acquire and represented career versatility, he said. Compared with Chinese families, “American families are not as utilitarian, and there is no phenomenon of society or the government guiding the choice of majors”, he added.
While engineering dominates in China, accounting for 36% of undergraduates in 2022 according to data from Statista, the rate in the US is 5%.
Business is the top major in the US, accounting for 19% of undergraduates in the 2021–2022 academic year, followed by health professions and social sciences, according to data from the National Centre for Education Statistics.
But that did not mean America was weaker in technological innovation than China, Chu, the Beijing researcher, said.
“For any individual to achieve their best, they must independently choose to pursue what interests them,” he said, adding that following that logic, the emphasis on personal enthusiasm in the US ultimately led to higher societal efficiency.
Having been consulted by many Chinese students on which fields to study over the past decades, he said “few had a clear idea what they wanted to do in the future and picked majors accordingly”. – South China Morning Post
