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“The role of a university is to cultivate young, innovative talents. SZTU benchmarks the German system of universities of applied sciences, which means we focus on three important aspects: research, teaching and practice,” Raps said. Most universities nowadays focus on teaching and research, instead of practice. Raps thinks practice is very important because innovation can only be achieved when it is combined with practice.

“SZTU has a good creative environment for students to practice skills such as drone operation, robotics, and racing car studios which are integrated with the teaching plans in the classrooms,” Raps noted. SZTU’s studios are affiliated with companies that help students practice in real life scenarios, going further than just learning from their books.

In a video link, Xu Yangsheng, president of CUHK-Shenzhen, thought innovation is a kind of culture, in which Shenzhen has its own characteristics. Innovation culture should be able to cultivate people’s ability in independent thinking and create an atmosphere that integrates with multiple cultures.

“Shenzhen, as a migrant city, has an innovation culture that is rarely seen in other places in the world. People with different backgrounds form different places gather together and create an innovation culture, ” Xu said.

Shenzhen’s innovation culture is also manifested through its complete industrial chain system which provides good environment for the cultivation and growth of innovative talents, who constitute the city’s innovation culture, according to Xu. He cited the university as an example, which has attracted 600-700 scientists and researchers from around the world who engage in various fields like AI, digital technology, materials science, and chemistry.

“Shenzhen is doing a good job in retaining its talents by providing great benefits such as education, health care, transportation, and more importantly, platforms where they can work well and utilize their abilities,” Xu said. These global talents in turn can further cultivate a new generation of talents and lead the city’s talent growth, Xu added.

In 2017, the city declared Nov. 1 as Shenzhen Talent Day to underscore its high regard for talents. According to the city’s talent affairs bureau, Shenzhen now boasts 22,000 high-level professionals, 190,000 overseas-educated personnel, and 86 full-time academicians. The total number of all kinds of talents has reached 6.79 million.