On 25 March 2026 (Wednesday), the Fifth Education Transformation and Innovation (ETI) Salon was held at the PolyU campus. The event brought together experts from Huazhong University of Science & Technology (HUST) and Wuhan University of Technology (WUT) to share the digital transformation journeys of their respective universities. Professor CAO Jiannong, Vice President (Education) and Director of IHERD, opened the session by expressing his deep appreciation for the advanced digital strategies implemented at these institutions. He noted that the progress made by both universities provides a compelling roadmap for the future of student-centred learning.
Professor Wang Linling, Professor in the School of Environmental Science and Engineering and Associate Dean of Qiming College (HUST), shared a comprehensive look at the "Qiming College" initiatives. She detailed how HUST is moving beyond traditional models to create an AI-empowered ecosystem. Central to this vision is a curriculum redesign that includes compulsory AI literacy for all students and the development of 15 "AI+ Micro-Majors" that bridge technical expertise with fields such as medicine and the humanities. Professor Wang emphasised the use of "Huaxiaozhi", an intelligent tutor, alongside a dual-teacher model to provide adaptive, personalised academic guidance. This shift focuses on mapping student competencies through "digital twins", ensuring that education is tailored to individual capacity-building rather than mere knowledge acquisition.
Professor Ma Bin, Director of the Information Office at Wuhan University of Technology (WUT), transitioned the discussion towards the underlying digital architecture required to sustain such innovation. He introduced WUT’s "13410" framework, which prioritises a data-driven approach to university governance. A key highlight was the "One Data Item, One Source" principle, supported by a massive exchange network of over 8,000 interfaces to ensure data integrity across the campus. Professor Ma demonstrated the university’s data visualisation tools, specifically the "Traffic Light" plan. This system uses a dashboard linkage for senior management to monitor institutional performance in real-time, using colour-coded alerts to manage everything from research output to facilities usage. By centralising these insights into an Intelligent Operation Centre (IOC), the university has created a "digital brain" capable of scientific decision-making and efficient task scheduling.
The session concluded with an interactive dialogue regarding the practical impact of these initiatives on the university community. The insights shared by Professor Wang and Professor Ma underscored a shared commitment to seizing the "new track" of digital transformation, ensuring that AI and digital technologies serves as a bridge to more effective and inclusive higher education.
| Research Units | Huazhong University of Science & Technology (HUST) | Wuhan University of Technology (WUT) |
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