Lingnan Education Celebrates 30 Years of Achievements

Hong Kong / Guangzhou, Dec 18, 2023 - (ACN Newswire) - South China Vocational Education Group Company Limited ("South China Vocational Education", Stock Code: 6913), a leading private formal vocational education service provider in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area ("GBA"), is pleased to share that its domestic entity, Guangzhou Lingnan Education Group ("Lingnan Education" or the "Group"), held its 30th Anniversary Development Conference on the 16 December at Hotel Nikko Guangzhou. In the 30 years since 1993 when it was established in Guangzhou, the Group has developed into a leader in vocational education in the GBA. The event retraced the Group's development in the past three decades and looked at the path it wishes to take in the future.

On the same day, the Group also unveiled the South China International Vocational Training Center, speaking to its determination to leverage its brand value, strong reputation in education, location advantage and teaching resources accumulated over 30 years to offer vocational training courses that are market-oriented for nurturing professional talent the market needs, and continue to equip students for pursuing further study or employment.

Total Student Enrollment Leaped in 30 years, a Leading Vocational Education Group in the GBA

The Group, which started with a single class of only 10 students 30 years ago, has become today a vocational education group with more than 26,000(1) full-time students and close to a total of 300,000 graduates, which is leading in the GBA, listed in Hong Kong and nationwide reputable. The Group operates two vocational schools in the GBA, namely Guangdong Lingnan Institute of Technology ("Lingnan Institute of Technology") and Guangdong Lingnan Modern Technician College ("Lingnan Modern Technician College"). The former is the only private provincial demonstration high-level vocational school and demonstration school of entrepreneurship and innovation in Guangdong, one of the top three in the country, while the latter has developed into a key technician college in the country and the largest in the province. The Group's business has also grown steadily. New enrollments of the two schools in the 2023/24 school year have increased substantially. As at 8 October 2023, they had taken in 13,888 new students, which represents a 27.1% increase year-on-year.

Actively Respond to National Policies, Breakthroughs Made in Industry-Education Integration

In recent years, the country has put much emphasis on the development of vocational education and has introduced a host of policies has been introduced to support industry-education integration. In June 2023, eight departments including the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Education jointly issued the "Implementation Plan for the Action to Enhance the Integration and Empowerment of Industry and Education in Vocational Education (2023-2025)", highlighting the development of vocational education and industry-education integration.

The Group has actively responded to relevant national policies, plus upheld the principle of "industry-education interaction, high-quality development" in integrating internal and external resources, taking integration of schools and enterprises to greater depth, and achieved excellent results. In 2021, the "Guangdong Industry-Education Integration Demonstration Park (Qingyuan)" under Lingnan Institute of Technology was approved by the Guangdong Provincial Development and Reform Commission as a key project in preparation, making the institute a school that has a provincial-level industry-education integration demonstration park in Guangdong. The Group cooperates with enterprises along the comprehensive healthcare industry chain to jointly build an industrial park that can offer comprehensive healthcare related vocational education plus serve as a production and R&D base of health industry enterprises, helping further industry-education integration and school-enterprise cooperation.

In addition, Lingnan Modern Technician College has started in-depth cooperation with more than 700 large enterprises, such as JD.com, Alibaba, GRG Banking and Tencent, establishing more than 1,000 off-campus professional practice bases, and managed to come up with such educational models as the "JD.com Model" for training e-commerce professionals, the "GRG banking Model" that covers electrical and mechanical disciplines, the "Schideron Model" for Internet of Things training and the "Yaguan Media Model" for grooming professional dancers. As a JD.com demonstration base of industry-education integration and having achieved outstanding results working with JD.com, Lingnan Modern Technician College has been named a "JD National Excellent Cooperative College" for eight consecutive years. The college is also planning with JD Technology Group and JD Industry-Education Integration Group to build a JF & Lingnan Industrial College to achieve greater breakthroughs in integrating industry and education.

With vocational education gaining importance, its system is going to gradually improve. The Group will closely observe related national policies and strive to diligently walk the path of high-quality development, continue to deepen industry-education integration, and improve the overall quality of education, teaching and talent training, shouldering the responsibility of training high-quality and skilled workers for various industries.

Adhere to the "Dual-Engine Driven" and "Five-in-one" Development Strategy Strive to Become a Great Industry-education Integration Group

In the past 30 years, the Group has closely followed national policies and market demand, insisting on developing the content and special characteristics of vocational education. Its hope is to, with dual engines" driving and via implementing its "five-in-one" industry-education ecological development strategy, realize its vision of "becoming a great industry-education integration group".

Regarding its business development strategy, the Group will continue to expand its campus network and the vocational education market in the GBA. Driven by its "dual engines" - academic education and vocational training, the Group is able to organically integrate the academic, practical and innovative aspects of different professions. That agrees with its unique educational logic and theory, hence can help consolidate its position as the leading vocational education provider in the GBA. At the same time, while working hard on steady development, quality improvement and upgrade of vocational education overall, the Group will also actively explore and expand business in five major realms – "training", "dispatch", "health", "e-commerce" and "public welfare" - giving it a new "five-in-one" development setup. Moreover, the Group will persevere with its school-running philosophy of firming up its footing in Lingnan and reaching out to the world. By offering simultaneously three types of education - liberal arts, entrepreneurship education and international education, the Group can integrate school running into national strategies, regional development and advancement of the industry, and nurture high-caliber technical and skilled workers with international perspective, love for the country and ability to meet social development needs.

Award-winning Company Dedicated to Charity

As the Group develops, it has earned the wide recognition in society and won various awards. It received the "Comprehensive Influence Benchmark Education Group" Award from Tencent for three years between 2021 and 2023, and the "Most Socially Responsible Listed Company" title from Zhitong Finance for two years in 2022 and 2023. Also, Lingnan Institute of Technology was named an Outstanding Contribution Institution for the 40th Anniversary of Guangzhou Private Education and boasts qualification for five provincial high-level professional disciplines, namely nursing, Chinese medicine, software technology, mold design and manufacturing, and animation production technology. And, between 2020 and now, Lingnan Modern Technician College has made the first batch of pilot organizations for vocational qualification level accreditation, the first batch of social training evaluation organizations and the "Cantonese cuisine master" training base all in Guangdong Province, and also the "National Higher Skilled Talent Training Site" title.

The Group is a keen participant in charitable social activities. Over the years, it has made use of its resources and advantages in vocational education to build a unique "vocational education+charity" education and public welfare model – with empowering with education as the core idea and revitalizing rural areas and fostering innovation and entrepreneurship as focus – to fulfil its corporate social responsibility. This year, at the 2023 Dream Builder Charity Conference, the Group's "Huangpu Sandu Technician Class" project won the "High-Quality Rural Revitalization Project of the Year" and was named also among the "Top 100 Responsible Brands" at "Responsibility 100 The 7th CSR China Education Ranking".

Mr. He Huishan, Founder, Executive Director and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Group, said: "The story of development of the Group over the past three decades tells of its hard work and efforts to improve, in line with the country's economic, social and vocational education development trend. The Group would not have been so widely recognized without its staff work hard and as one. In the future, we will continue to deliver on the mission of nurturing outstanding talent for the society, and lead the Group on a new journey of transformation and breakthrough, following closely national policies, starting the new engine running for industry-education integration and embarking on a thorough reform of skilled talent grooming, to the end of providing the country with an endless stream of high-caliber talent to help her execute her regional economic development strategies and transform and upgrade industries, and for us, to realize the ambition of running schools with fame that can last for centuries."

(1) According to the 2023 interim report of the Group, total number of full-time students enrolled in Lingnan Institute of Technology and Lingnan Modern Technician College for the 2022/2023 academic year was 26,743.