School bells are ringing again across Syria, but for thousands of children, the return to class offers little relief, with each school day a reminder of what the war has taken.
Eight-year-old Tasnim walks several kilometers home after classes each day, passing streets marked by destruction and the ruins of another school not far from her house.
Her family came back to Syria two years ago, not by choice but because they had nowhere else to go.
"When we returned to Damascus, I signed up for a school here. Because the schools near our house are all devastated and out of service, I moved to a school far away. Going back and forth is hard to do every day. I wish the nearby schools weren't damaged," Tasnim said.
Amid the rubble, Tasnim's house is still standing. With no electricity to light the room, she studies only in daylight.
"When I come back from school, I help my dad with his work, and sometimes I go with him to send his work to his employer. Then I come back to study during the day, as the battery runs out of power at night and there's no light. After that, I go to bed," she said.
Between damaged walls and broken doors, Tasnim's father works as a cobbler. With his daughter's help, he can get more work done and earn a little extra to support the family.
"The services here are crippled, especially as no electricity grid is available. We need solar power, but most people can't afford it," said Mahmoud Rushdi, Tasnim's father.
"There are a lot of risks also, as the area is deserted and abandoned, and when our children go to school, we worry about them being kidnapped. Living in such a place requires a high level of caution," he added.
More than 7,000 schools in Syria have been damaged or destroyed by years of conflict, leaving thousands of children struggling for an education. Syria's efforts to get its children back into classrooms remain one of the country's biggest challenges.
Syrian children return to class amid ruins, hardship
China has established 50 national academies for outstanding engineers and jointly trained nearly 36,000 master's and doctoral engineering students with enterprises, officials said at a conference on advancing industry-education integrated training for elite engineers held in Beijing on Sunday.
The elite engineer training program, launched in 2022, seeks to integrate industry and academia to nurture engineers capable of addressing technological challenges and leading industrial upgrades. It is seen as a crucial move by China to build a highly skilled workforce, with the academies developed in partnership with State-owned enterprises and designed to train engineers with a focus on innovation and practical problem-solving.
At Zhejiang University's National Academy for Outstanding Engineers, more than 1,700 master's and doctoral students began their studies this fall semester. In their first year, they will solidify their theoretical foundation through hands-on practical training before moving into industry with real-world problems to complete a closed loop of growth from classroom to industry.
"We align closely with major national strategies and focus on critical technological bottlenecks, establishing joint university-industry mentor teams led by strategic scientists. We have successively launched over 40 excellence-oriented training programs spanning key fields such as smart energy, artificial intelligence and integrated circuits," said Zhang Guangxin, dean of the National Academy for Outstanding Engineers.
Since the reform was launched, the program has focused on meeting the urgent needs of national strategy and industrial upgrading. Engineering master's and doctoral students have produced more than 26,000 innovation outcomes, most of which have been transformed and applied on site.
As of August this year, more than 400 engineering master's and doctoral students nationwide have obtained degrees based on practical achievements such as product design and scheme design, breaking the tradition of evaluating degrees solely by papers. Among the first cohort of graduates, 81 percent found employment at key enterprises in their respective fields.
"We will continue to deepen the industry-education integrated training mechanism. We will support provinces in building provincial-level excellent engineer academies. At the same time, we will extend the elite engineer training model to all 67 professional degree categories, to other countries and regions, and to the field of undergraduate education," said Hao Tongliang, deputy director of the Department of Degree Management and Postgraduate Education of the Ministry of Education.
China expands elite engineer training model after producing 36,000 industry-trained talents
