"Double First-Class" Universities "Cut" 16 Majors Release Major Signal

In 2026, during the National People’s Congress and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, Liao Xiangzhong, member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and Secretary of the Party Committee at Communication University of China, made headlines when he announced at a panel meeting that he would “cut 16 undergraduate majors and directions, including translation and photography” in one go.

Communication University of China is a well-known “Double First Class” university. After the news broke, many netizens exclaimed, even prestigious schools are suddenly “cutting” so many majors. What should students study in the future?

However, Liao Xiangzhong responded to the media, saying, “There’s no need to panic. In the era of artificial intelligence, some specialized fields like technical training are no longer necessary as standalone majors and need to be phased out or transferred. After seven or eight years of effort, the disciplines and majors at Communication University of China have basically been adjusted.”

The two sessions have sent a strong signal regarding the adjustment of university disciplines and majors. Minister of Education Huai Jinpeng introduced at the Fourth Session of the 14th National People’s Congress that moving forward, universities will vigorously shift from focusing on discipline development to serving the national mission, deeply integrating into the overall development of national modernization.

The fundamental reason for these adjustments is the wave of intelligence, which blurs traditional disciplinary boundaries. Additionally, AI has brought about another major change in demand: talents in liberal arts, sciences, medicine, and other fields need to strengthen engineering literacy.

Source: Photo by Reporter Liang Yuanhao

Interdisciplinary and Adjustment of Disciplines and Majors

In 2018, Communication University of China proposed the “Four Batches” construction plan, which includes “closing and transferring some majors, upgrading and transforming some, focusing on building some, and planning and designing some.” Now, the dynamic adjustment of majors and disciplines occurs annually.

Liao Xiangzhong told the media that some majors are not “cut,” such as the photography major, which was merged into the Film and Television Photography and Production major because a standalone photography major can no longer support itself.

Due to rapid changes in economic and social development and talent demand, disciplines and majors with excessive distribution or saturated markets must be adjusted through restrictions, stopping recruitment, or revocation.

Communication University of China adjusted 16 majors and directions in one move, but this was not even the most aggressive effort. Similar large-scale discipline and major adjustments are already common across domestic universities.

For example, Sichuan University launched a pilot program to “accelerate the establishment of warning and exit mechanisms for existing disciplines and majors,” controlling the scale of first-level disciplines, reasonably compressing second-level disciplines, while simultaneously expanding the scale of science, engineering, and medical talent training, and moderately reducing the scale of economics, management, arts, and other saturated disciplines. Since 2019, the university’s first-level disciplines have been reduced from 71 to 56, second-level disciplines outside the catalog from 191 to 67, and undergraduate majors from 144 to 105.

By 2025, Jiangxi Province’s general undergraduate colleges will cease recruitment and revoke 349 majors, with an adjustment and optimization rate of 20.6%; vocational colleges will stop recruitment and revoke 157 majors, with an adjustment rate of 23.5%.

In addition to adding and removing majors, interdisciplinary integration is a new trend in discipline and major adjustments. Communication University of China has developed an interdisciplinary field in journalism and public opinion studies, focusing on areas such as opinion and cognition communication, news and public opinion and national governance, opinion intelligent computing and applications, and social governance.

A new interdisciplinary major, Low-Altitude Technology and Engineering, was established at Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications by integrating resources from information and communication engineering, computer science and technology, and intelligent science and technology. The program includes core courses such as communication principles, low-altitude communication technology, and intelligent flight technology, with all interdisciplinary courses equipped with practical components.

Minister of Education Huai Jinpeng announced at the livelihood-themed press conference that this year, the national interdisciplinary center will be launched to break through frontier interdisciplinary fields, further enhancing original innovation capacity and cultivating new productive forces.

The authorities are also reforming mechanisms to encourage and support universities in adjusting disciplines and majors. Huai Jinpeng explained that the discipline and major catalog, initially revised every ten or five years, has now been optimized and updated annually with a list of urgent needs, enabling the same year’s planning and recruitment.

During the “14th Five-Year Plan” period, 8,600 new undergraduate majors and over 4,500 master’s degree points were added, with most adjustments aligning with future development and comprehensive human growth.

Initiation of a New Round of “Double First Class” Construction Standards

The “Double First Class” initiative is a major project for university discipline and major development. Huai Jinpeng announced at the livelihood-themed press conference that a new round of standards for the “Double First Class” construction is underway, supporting research universities to lead and pioneer in supporting national strategies.

Launched in 2015, the first batch included 42 world-class universities such as Peking University and Tsinghua University, and 98 universities like Beijing Jiaotong University and Tianjin University of Technology for world-class disciplines.

The second batch, announced in 2022, includes 147 universities, removing distinctions between first-class universities and disciplines, emphasizing categorized development across basic sciences, engineering, philosophy, and social sciences. Peking University and Tsinghua University can independently determine their construction disciplines.

Comparing the two lists, the second round emphasizes discipline-based development, downplaying institutional labels, and exploring new models of autonomous and distinctive development.

However, the current deep impact of the new technological revolution and industrial transformation has begun to loosen the boundaries between disciplines and majors, with clear trends toward interdisciplinarity and frontier research. This poses challenges for how to set standards for the third round of “Double First Class” construction.

Huai Jinpeng’s remarks at the press conference signal important developments. He said that moving forward, universities will strongly shift from focusing on discipline development to serving the national mission, deeply integrating into the overall modernization of the country.

Li Zhiming, Vice President of the Chinese Society of Educational Development Strategy and Chair of the Talent Development Committee, believes that profound changes in social structure, technological environment, and global landscape mean that the third round of “Double First Class” must shift from merely responding to era demands to leading development.

“Major advances in fields like artificial intelligence, quantum information, life sciences, and new energy are shortening technology update cycles. If universities remain stuck in traditional discipline segmentation and knowledge transfer models, they will struggle to keep pace with rapid technological frontiers,” Li Zhiming told 21st Century Business Herald.

He added that China is at a critical stage of industrial upgrading and technological self-reliance. High-quality development is the main theme, and new productive forces are accelerating formation. Under this background, the “Double First Class” initiative is no longer just an internal quality enhancement project but a vital support for national development strategies.

Systematic Enhancement of Students’ Engineering Literacy

The wave of intelligence has also raised new requirements for cultivating top innovative talents: they must possess certain engineering literacy.

Ming Dong, member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and Vice President of Tianjin University, pointed out that with the rapid clinical translation of AI, surgical robots, and medical big data, developed countries in Europe and America have taken the lead, elevating engineering literacy from an “elective” to a “core competency” for future doctors.

He told 21st Century Business Herald that international front-line practices show that medical education is shifting from “experience-driven” to “data and engineering-driven” paradigms. Skills such as engineering thinking, system modeling, and human-machine collaboration are becoming indispensable core qualities for future physicians.

In 2020, China issued the “Guiding Opinions on Accelerating Innovation and Development of Medical Education,” emphasizing “leading medical education innovation with new medicine.” However, compared to the rapid technological-driven changes in healthcare, there are still significant gaps in training concepts, knowledge structures, interdisciplinary integration, system iteration, and practical abilities.

Ming Dong suggested upgrading the “National Excellent Physician Talent Training Program 3.0,” with deep integration of “clinical medicine + intelligent medicine” as a key breakthrough to systematically improve medical students’ engineering literacy. Especially, reconstructing the knowledge system to include intelligent medicine as a main component of clinical training.

Gao Yao, professor at Tianjin University School of Education, believes that solving the challenge of cultivating top innovative talents depends on “real problems” driving “real training,” forging skills that meet future needs.

He pointed out that “real problems” arise in authentic contexts, which often transcend single disciplines or majors. This requires universities to continuously break disciplinary and even institutional boundaries during talent cultivation, actively responding to urgent needs in real scenarios, and creating a more conducive environment for talent growth.

In these “real problem” contexts, improving students’ engineering literacy through school-enterprise cooperation is inevitable. Wang Xiaofei, director of social training at Dezhou Engineering Vocational College and a member of the National People’s Congress, suggested focusing on key industrial chains and strategic emerging industries, clarifying the leading role of top enterprises and chain leaders in training, and establishing policies to support their formation of industry-education alliances and industry colleges.

He proposed increasing financial investment, setting up special funds for industry-education integration, supporting enterprises in building training bases and developing courses, and allowing tax deductions for vocational education expenses. Enterprises hosting internships or faculty secondments should also receive special subsidies.

“Platforms can be built by the government, with clear rules for sharing benefits and risks, and mechanisms for cooperation, to share training risks through service purchases and project subsidies, achieving win-win cooperation between schools and enterprises,” Wang Xiaofei concluded.