From July 25 to 29, 2026, the National College Students’ Metallographic Skills Competition, guided by the Teaching Steering Committee for Materials‑Related Majors of Institutions of Higher Education under the Ministry of Education, concluded successfully. As one of the national‑level disciplinary competitions with the highest specifications and greatest influence in the field of materials science across China, this event attracted participation from 567 universities offering materials‑related programs nationwide, with a total of 1522 outstanding contestants competing on the same stage to demonstrate their professional knowledge and practical capabilities. After multiple rounds of fierce competition, students from our university delivered an outstanding performance and yielded fruitful achievements. Gu Yifei, a student majoring in Materials Science and Engineering, won the national individual First Prize. This marks the third time our university has claimed an individual First Prize in this competition. This breakthrough achievement formally indicates that our university’s competitiveness in materials‑related disciplinary competitions and the quality of practical‑teaching‑oriented talent training have successfully ranked among the top 15% of universities nationwide and the first‑tier of universities in Shanghai, fully demonstrating the university’s school‑running strength and talent‑cultivation outcomes.
Our students won multiple honors across different competition tracks. Qin Wenchu received the Second Prize in the Individual Skills Track; Wu Shuohan and Huang Jie were awarded the Second Prize in the Innovation and Application Track; Liu Yunbo obtained the Third Prize in the Individual Skills Track; Sun Bo won the Third Prize in the Comprehensive Analysis Track; Gu Che and Shen Aili took home the Third Prize in the Innovation and Application Track. These multiple national‑level awards fully reflect the fine academic ethos of USST students — diligent learning, critical thinking, rigorous practical operation and courage to innovate — as well as their solid professional practical competence.
Behind these remarkable achievements lie the university’s long‑term commitment to practice‑oriented talent cultivation, together with years of dedicated instruction and hard work from the faculty advisor team. The coaching team, including Li Shengjuan, Yue Xuezheng, Bi Wei and Xu Gaopeng from the School of Materials and Chemistry, as well as Yu Mingliang, Ni Weiyu, Yao Shengwei and Duan Pengyun from the Public Experimental Center, has long been engaged in competition guidance work. Rooted in professional teaching and focusing on practical innovation, the advisors provide tailored and meticulous instruction for students. They keep building high‑level platforms for disciplinary competitions and practical innovation, fostering batches of outstanding students with prominent professional competence and comprehensive qualities, and supporting students to achieve excellent results on national competition stages. Two faculty members, Duan Pengyun and Yue Xuezheng, were honored as Excellent Instructors of this competition. Yue Xuezheng, who has served as an official judge for this national competition for many years and devoted himself to metallographic teaching and competition guidance, was awarded the 15th‑Anniversary Medal of Merit for his contributions to the development of the contest, which well illustrates the solid professional expertise and industrial influence of our university’s faculty.
The National College Students’ Metallographic Skills Competition serves as an important national‑level platform to evaluate the teaching outcomes of materials‑related majors and showcase the talent‑training standards of higher‑education institutions. The fruitful achievements obtained in this competition constitute a vivid practice of our university’s deep‑going reform in practical teaching and its talent‑cultivation philosophy of “promoting learning, teaching and innovation through competitions”. They are also an outstanding achievement made through the joint efforts of faculty and students devoted to talent education. These excellent competition results serve as a grand tribute to the 120th Anniversary of the founding of the University of Shanghai for Science and Technology. The university will continue to strengthen disciplinary development and talent cultivation, further optimize its practical‑teaching system, and enhance the training of students’ innovative awareness and hands‑on capabilities. By leveraging high‑level disciplinary competitions to cultivate high‑quality application‑oriented talents, USST will steadily raise its disciplinary influence and talent‑training quality, thus injecting lasting momentum into the high‑quality development of the university.
Full text: https://chxy.usst.edu.cn/2026/0731/c3680a369251/page.htm