These directions are worth paying attention to. Which major should I choose for this year's college entrance examination? Looking at the Development | Integrated Circuit | Direction from the Changes of 12 Years of Major in Higher Education

The 2023 college entrance examination is approaching, and for students, "university majors" have become the first crossroads of their life choices.

With the development of the economy and society, a common trend is that the adjustment of majors in universities is becoming more and more frequent. This year, the addition, revocation, and adjustment of undergraduate majors in ordinary higher education institutions in China have involved more than 2800 majors, accounting for 4.5% of the current total number of majors.

Can you understand the direction of future development from these adjustments?

Interdisciplinary integration trend

The hottest event in the technology industry this year is undoubtedly the emergence of Chat GPT, and the field of artificial intelligence has once again become popular.

However, from the perspective of the layout of newly added majors in universities in the past two years, the number of new schools for pure "artificial intelligence" majors has shown a downward trend, reaching its peak in 2019 and gradually decreasing thereafter.

The growth trend of major categories such as "Intelligent Science and Technology" has also slowed down, and the number of new schools added in the past three years has been in single digits.

On the other hand, artificial intelligence is gradually becoming a tool and integrating into various fields. Interdisciplinary and interdisciplinary majors based on artificial intelligence have blossomed everywhere in the past two years.

According to the "Record and Approval Results for Undergraduate Majors in Ordinary Higher Education Institutions" released by the Ministry of Education in the past three years, artificial intelligence technology has been integrated with 23 disciplines, resulting in emerging majors such as "Intelligent Water Conservancy", "Intelligent Forestry", and "Intelligent Aircraft Technology".

Among them, "Intelligent Manufacturing Engineering" is the most popular, with 176 schools adding this major in the past three years.

Similar to artificial intelligence, data related majors also show a trend of intersection and integration.

In 2017, 250 schools added majors in Data Science and Big Data Technology. Subsequently, based on the development of data resources and digital technology, the "Digital Economy" profession has broken through the circle and surpassed artificial intelligence in 2022, winning the crown of new quantity.

The return of high-tech engineering

In addition to the above-mentioned interdisciplinary fields, it is worth noting that the development of high-tech industries in recent years has driven the "recovery" of engineering majors.

The most typical major is "Integrated Circuit Design and Integrated Systems".

As early as 2010, Shenzhen University was the first to offer this major, but it has been lukewarm for ten years, with only a few schools offering this major. Until 2019, the number of schools adding this major was in single digits.

The lack of relevant talent cultivation also limits the growth rate of the industry to a certain extent. From the perspective of industrial development scale, although the domestic integrated circuit production has been increasing year by year, due to strong demand and high external dependence of integrated circuits, there is still a significant trade deficit.

The turning point was in 2018.

Affected by the trade war between China and the United States, China has placed greater emphasis on the development of the integrated circuit industry and has introduced multiple supportive policies.

This is also directly reflected in the number of schools offering related majors in the past two years.

In addition, the development of the new energy industry and energy storage industry has also driven the popularity of a series of new specialties.

Taking the energy storage industry as an example.

According to the CNESA Global Energy Storage Project Database, the domestic energy storage industry has developed rapidly in the past two years. As of the end of 2022, the cumulative installed capacity of power storage projects that have been put into operation in China is 59.8 GW, with an annual growth rate of 38%, accounting for 25% of the total global market size. And the scale will continue to grow.

Correspondingly, the "Energy Storage Science and Engineering" major has emerged in major universities.

For example, Shanghai University of Technology was one of the first schools to add this major in 2020, relying on the School of Energy and Power Engineering to meet the domestic demand for talent and technology in the field of energy storage.

"Slimming" that keeps pace with the times

There are many reasons for the increase and decrease of majors in universities every year, including insufficient enrollment, low education quality, poor employment quality, and adjustments in school education direction.

Although the reasons vary, they also reflect to some extent the overall direction of social development - "more specific positioning and more focused training.".

From the data of the past twelve years, universities have made the most frequent adjustments to management majors.

For example, "Public Utility Management" and "Information Management and Information Systems" are the two majors that have been most removed by schools and are still on the rise.

Many netizens joke that in some schools, the teaching content of management majors is too vague, and the core courses lack competitiveness, resulting in students lacking clear employment directions and professional skills.

From the perspective of professional alternation, the transformation of management majors in universities from virtual to real is also underway in recent years.

For example, the newly added "Elderly Care Service Management" in 2020, "Entrepreneurship Management" in 2021, "Charity Management" and "Natural Resource Registration and Management" in 2022 all combine management expertise with more specific industries.

Shanghai universities focus on "engineering"

The trend of professional changes in Shanghai's universities in the past twelve years is also very obvious - constantly exploring new disciplines, establishing and highlighting the advantages and characteristics of universities themselves.

According to the fourth round of discipline evaluation by the Ministry of Education, the advantages of Shanghai universities are concentrated in humanities and social sciences, medicine, and management.

"Engineering" is currently the main focus of Shanghai universities' efforts.

Not only does it far exceed other degrees in terms of the total number of newly added majors, but it is also one of the earliest new engineering fields in the country, such as artificial intelligence, data science, and big data technology, which is in line with the national strategic development trend and talent needs.

When Shanghai universities layout their disciplines and majors, they also focus on showcasing their own characteristics and coordinating the development of classification and sub items.

For example, Tongji University has continuously expanded its engineering majors in the past 12 years. Among the 22 newly added majors, over 30% are engineering majors, including energy and power engineering, materials science and engineering, etc.

Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, which enjoys multiple A+disciplines in the field of medicine, also combined artificial intelligence with medicine in 2019 and opened an intelligent medical engineering major to leverage its own advantages.

According to the latest report released by the World Economic Forum - "Future Work 2023", artificial intelligence will be a key factor affecting industries and employment for at least the next five years. From the current data, it can be seen that the changes in majors in domestic universities are in line with the current mainstream trend. Based on the development of artificial intelligence, cross disciplinary and interdisciplinary integration has been achieved, promoting the emergence of more new engineering, medical, agricultural, and humanities disciplines.