Harbin Institute of Technology

Written by: ZHANG Yan
Translated by: DU Yufei
Edited by: William Mosteller
Date: 04-26

On April 24th, the fourth "China Aerospace Day", Wang Shuquan, secretary of the Party Committee of Harbin Institute of Technology, came to Harbin Xianghe Primary School, the designated unit receiving HIT volunteer service, to celebrate the day with the pupils and unveiled the Space Culture Reading Room together with Zhao Cheng, principal of Xianghe Primary School.

Wang Shuquan and his entourage watched the training of the Xianghe Primary School football team by student volunteers of HIT and a performance of the original songs "Grab the Comet's Little Tail" and "Small Dreams and Big Dreams", presented by Xianghe students. Moreover, they had a cordial talk with the pupils and encouraged them to explore the unknown with lofty aspirations and dreams in mind. The pupils were also urged to pursue space-related dreams and strive to make our motherland advanced in the field of aerospace by hard work and healthy growth.

Wang Shuquan and his group held discussions with Li Xiangqian, deputy director of Xiangfang District Education Bureau, leaders of Xianghe Primary School, and representatives of teachers and students. Through the discussions, they received a detailed understanding of the actual needs of Xianghe Primary School in its operation and teaching. Wang Shuquan said that, on the basis of the past good volunteer service, Harbin Institute of Technology, as a national key university located in Heilongjiang, would continue to do a good job in the next step of "big hands holding small hands" , in accordance with the important directives on the training and education of children and adolescents by General Secretary Xi Jinping and the relevant work requirements of the provincial party committee and provincial government. HIT will give full play to its advantages in talents, technology, and resources and will actively organize and mobilize more university students to participate in volunteer service, so that "big hands" and "small hands" can be tightly held together. Thus, we can create a better environment and conditions for young people’s learning and growth and work with Xianghe Primary School to cultivate well-educated socialist builders and successors.

In order to implement the important instructions by General Secretary Xi Jinping on the first "China Aerospace Day" to "inspire all, especially the young, to advocate science, explore the unknown and dare to innovate", HIT has built a reading room for aerospace culture in Xianghe Primary School, fully utilizing our aerospace characteristics and advantages. The reading room displays things donated by HIT, such as space models and popular science books. The walls of the reading room are decorated with slogans showing the spirit of aerospace, the spirit of HIT, and the spirit of Xianghe Primary School, the time axis of HIT's achievements in the space field, and photos of the Longjiang II satellite, the "most beautiful" group photo of the Earth and the moon, and the infrared remote sensing image of the Lilac II nanosatellite, all of which reflect the aerospace culture. Moreover, the intelligent robot donated by the HIT Le Ju Robot Company also has a display window and an operating area in the reading room.

Xianghe Primary School is the only whole-day public primary school in Chenggaozi Town, a suburb of Harbin. The school has 15 classes with more than 400 students, 60% of whom are rural left-behind children, migrant children, and children of special families. On May 31st, 2017, Zhang Qingwei, secretary of the Heilongjiang Provincial CPC Committee, visited children and teaching staff at Xianghe Primary School and stressed that "nurturing children and adolescents should be regarded as a long-term strategic task, and efforts should be made to create better conditions for them to learn and grow up healthily". Upon understanding the actual needs of the school, the Foundation for Educational Development of HIT donated books, teaching aids, and stationery to it.

In October 2017, with the support of the Youth League Committee of HIT, the Volunteer Association of the School of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry officially joined with Xianghe Primary School and established the Rainbow Volunteer Group for Xianghe Primary School. The members of the regiment set up four regular talent-enriching courses for Xianghe students, including Ukelele, Xingyiquan (a kind of gymnastics), sign language, and football, and two practical courses such as Aerospace Knowledge in Campus and Interesting Chemistry Experiments. In addition, they’ve also designed another practical course on visitng HIT, in which they usher teachers and students from Xianghe primary school to visit our laboratories, museums, and aerospace museums on special days such as "China Aerospace Day", the Anniversary of the Founding of HIT, and the "June 1st" International Children's Day. Through these courses, Xianghe teachers and students are able to get a better understanding of the spiritual and cultural traditions of HIT, the history of HIT, the stories between HIT and China's aerospace industry, and the spirit of the "800 strong men" of HIT, which further sows into the hearts of children the seeds of growth, success, and patriotic struggle. In December 2018, the volunteer group also organized a "Rainbow Warm Pack" event to deliver items such as cotton jackets and trousers for Xianghe primary school left-behind children to wear during the winter.

Representatives from the HIT Youth League Committee, School of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry, HIT Le Ju Robot Company, and Rainbow Volunteer Group were involved in these activities.