Since 2015, the ECUT has been enrolling experimental classes in the direction of tourism geology, and in 2020 Tourism Geoscience and Planning Engineering was formally approved as a new major by Chinese Ministry of Education.
China’s tourism geoscience talents mainly have been trained for Master and Doctor Degrees when the tourism geoscience discipline was firstly established in 1985. Therefore, the tourism geoscience major has been excluded from undergraduate catalogue of the Chinese Ministry of Education, and as a result, it is seriously lack in applied talent. In 2015, the major’s model for training undergraduate was explored in ECUT. After many years of practice, the ECUT educators created a multi-disciplinary integration training model that includes geology, geography, urban planning and tourism management subjects, relying on school’s various talents training experience and scientific researches in traditional dominant discipline of geoscience. This model was tightly connected with regional economic and social development of Jiangxi Province. With concerns and supports of local governments, the major of Tourism Geoscience and Planning Engineering was successfully issued by Chinese Ministry of Education, and listed in “the Undergraduate Specialty Catalogue of Higher Institutions”. In the autumn of 2020, this new major will become the first and unique major for enrolling students in China, which provides a template for applying similar major for other domestic colleges. In the need of the major, a series of practice bases, such as the Danxia Mountain of Guangdong Province, Jiangshan mountain of Zhejiang Province, and Lushan Mountain, Meiling mountain and Longhushan mountain of Jiangxi Province, have been set up.
A report in Natural Resources Newspaper to the first undergraduate program of tourism geosciences approved by the Ministry of Education
The Second Symposium on Tourism Geoscience Discipline Construction and Geopark Development, sponsored by the Tourism Geology and Geopark Branch and the Geological Education Branch of Chinese Geological Society, was held in 2018.
From April 13 to 15 of 2018, the Second Symposium on Tourism Geoscience Discipline Construction and Geopark Development was undertaken commonly by East China University of Technology and Geo-tourism Specialized Committee of Jiangxi Provincial Geological Society in Nanchang city, Jiangxi Province. About 90 tourism geoscience experts from 30 universities and scientific institutions in China gathered to discuss futures of tourism geoscience major and geopark development, specifically, to create tourism geoscience specialty construction standards, subject characteristics, curriculum system, science popularization and social service, and to explore professional framework and operation methods for some important problems of tourism geoscience research and geopark construction. This conference laid a foundation of accelerating tourism geoscience discipline construction, and spelt a new chapter of improving major talent-nurturing systems including these for undergraduate, master and doctor degrees.
he Second Symposium on Tourism Geoscience Discipline Construction and Geopark Development
The Third Symposium on Tourism Geoscience Discipline Construction, sponsored by the Tourism Geology and Geopark Branch and the Geological Education Branch of Chinese Geological Society, was held in 2019.
From May 20 to 22 of 2019, the Third Symposium on Tourism Geoscience Discipline Construction and Geopark Development was undertaken commonly by East China University of Technology, China University Of Geosciences (Beijing) and Geological Publishing House in Beijing. More than 60 representatives from 29 institutes and enterprises attended the symposium, aiming at discussing the tourism geoscience development and textbook construction. Researcher Li Tingdong and Professor Zhao Pengda, both the Academicians of Chinese Academy of Sciences, delivered keynote speeches that focused on cultivating professional talents and writing series of core tourism geoscience teaching materials through academic exchanges. The conference aimed to impetus tourism geoscience discipline construction, standardize talent training programs, and provide more outstanding geo-tourism professionals for nature reserve management and ecological civilization construction.
The Third Symposium on Tourism Geoscience Discipline Construction
