How to develop interdisciplinary research in Colleges and Universities
2022-05-17
Promoting interdisciplinary research is the common development trend and important development strategy of high-level research universities in the world. In recent years, with the deepening of the "double first-class" construction of colleges and universities in China, the national policy level has paid more and more attention to interdisciplinary research in Colleges and universities. The implementation measures for comprehensively promoting the construction of world-class universities and first-class disciplines, the guiding opinions on accelerating the construction of "double first-class" in Colleges and universities, and some opinions on further promoting the construction of world-class universities and first-class disciplines clearly put forward that colleges and universities should optimize the layout of chemical disciplines, break the barriers between traditional disciplines, highlight the cross integration and collaborative innovation of disciplines, and vigorously promote the innovation of scientific research organization mode, Strengthen organized innovation and encourage high-quality cooperation across universities, institutions and disciplines. Interdisciplinary research is not only the basis for the formation of interdisciplinary, but also the inevitable path for the deepening development of interdisciplinary concept, theory and method system. However, the breadth and depth of interdisciplinary research in Colleges and universities in China are still very limited. The reason is that the development of interdisciplinary research still faces deep-seated multiple obstacles and constraints. Therefore, identifying and removing the corresponding obstacles is the key to further promote the interdisciplinary research in Colleges and universities. Three obstacles caused by invisible "boundary" Interdisciplinary research is a multidisciplinary interdisciplinary research behavior that integrates the perspectives, concepts, theories, tools and technologies of two or more disciplines and aims at major frontier and complex problems beyond a single discipline. In essence, it is an interdisciplinary research activity that crosses the invisible "boundary" of traditional disciplines. The long-standing invisible "boundary" between traditional disciplines has become the root of hindering the high-quality development of interdisciplinary research. The lack of organizational carrier in interdisciplinary research is the first obstacle. For a long time, the scientific research activities of colleges and universities in China are mainly carried out within colleges, and colleges are usually based on a single discipline system. Therefore, single discipline research dominates the scientific research activities of colleges and universities. With the development and growth of the college, the college will gradually add scientific research organizations such as research centers, research institutes, laboratories and bases. The research fields of these scientific research organizations are more focused and focus on a certain research direction under a single discipline. This single discipline scientific research organization system follows the logic of knowledge differentiation and continues to "fission" within the discipline knowledge, resulting in the narrowing of the research of the discipline community. Traditional discipline organization provides an organizational carrier for single discipline research, which becomes the organizational ownership of discipline members (individuals or teams). However, the discipline organization dominated by a single discipline is obviously unable to carry out interdisciplinary research by itself. Carrying out interdisciplinary research with other discipline organizations faces strict organizational barriers among disciplines, which makes it difficult to carry out interdisciplinary exchanges and cooperation effectively. Therefore, the interdisciplinary research in Colleges and universities lacks the corresponding interdisciplinary organization as the carrier. The lack of organizational carrier directly restricts the integration of multi-disciplinary research resources and the development of interdisciplinary research in Colleges and universities, making it difficult for scholars to have a sense of identity and belonging to interdisciplinary research. The second obstacle is the absence of the system suitable for interdisciplinary research. At present, the internal and external systems supporting interdisciplinary research in Colleges and universities are absent. In terms of internal system, the academic system of colleges and universities dominated by traditional discipline organizations is born in response to the needs of discipline organizations. Accordingly, the existing discipline organization system pays more attention to the research of a single discipline, forming a traditional academic recognition mechanism covering teacher appointment, assessment and evaluation, promotion, resource allocation, reward and punishment incentives, driving teachers to "climb" along the mature academic career track in their disciplines. Interdisciplinary research is different from the traditional single discipline research mode, but a new knowledge production mode, which has the distinctive characteristics of multi-agent, interdisciplinary, application-oriented and so on. The existing organizational system of colleges and universities is based on the traditional scientific research model. The identification of scientific research achievements, performance assessment, scientific research incentive and professional title evaluation of academic personnel are based on their disciplines. The corresponding system serves the scientific research organization of a single discipline, but it is a frame limit for the Research of cross disciplines. The institutional system applicable to traditional discipline research organizations makes interdisciplinary research behavior and research results face institutional bottlenecks such as difficult to evaluate, unable to be included in the identification scope of assessment and promotion results, and difficult to calculate the workload in interdisciplinary team cooperation, which will undoubtedly limit the development of interdisciplinary research. In terms of external system, China's current discipline evaluation system mainly evaluates the discipline development level of colleges and universities according to the discipline classification, which strengthens the "narrow" scientific research activities of teachers in their disciplines. Under the baton effect guided by the national discipline evaluation, the evaluation of scientific research organizations in Colleges and universities is also dominated by disciplines, and the allocation of discipline construction resources is carried out according to the discipline evaluation results, which further solidifies the closed development mode of disciplines, makes the resources scattered under various disciplines, and it is difficult to realize the effective aggregation of resources. Under the comprehensive effect of internal and external evaluation, the scientific research model of colleges and universities emphasizes the growth of discipline knowledge, and relatively ignores the actual needs of scientific and Technological Development and industry. The scientific research carried out by colleges and universities fails to meet the actual needs of industry enterprises, and the conversion rate of scientific research achievements is low, which leads to the lack of enthusiasm of industry enterprises to invest scientific research resources in Colleges and universities and cooperate in scientific research. Over time, it leads to the poor interaction and connection between science and technology, education and industry. This is also the problem that China needs to solve to solve the "neck" technical problem and realize the self-reliance and self-improvement of science and technology. The third obstacle is that the organizational culture encouraging interdisciplinary research has not been formed. The cultural diversity of disciplines in China's colleges and universities is the "integration of disciplines", that is, the cultural diversity of disciplines, rather than the cultural diversity of disciplines. Different discipline organizations (departments) in Colleges and universities are separated from each other, and the interaction between disciplines is insufficient and the mechanism is not smooth; The internal connection of the discipline is loose, and the discipline members are used to "fighting alone", mainly carrying out scientific research in the form of "self-employed", which is limited to their respective research fields. The discipline oriented scientific research organization form and its matching organization system cause the academic research organizations in Colleges and universities to be operated and developed separately, and even there are many portals. The respective discipline organization culture does not encourage research activities across discipline boundaries, restricts the full integration of multi-disciplinary forces in Colleges and universities, virtually inhibits the formation of interdisciplinary research culture and hinders the smooth development of interdisciplinary research. Strategies of interdisciplinary research in Colleges and Universities Facing the increasingly complicated situation in the field of science and technology and real social problems, interdisciplinary research is becoming more and more important. Colleges and universities should give full play to their organizational ability and strive to consolidate the organizational, institutional and cultural foundation for promoting interdisciplinary research. First, innovate the organizational form of interdisciplinary research. The in-depth development of interdisciplinary research in Colleges and universities needs to rely on an exclusive organizational carrier, namely interdisciplinary scientific research organization. Colleges and universities should strive to break down the barriers of traditional discipline organization, innovate the form of organization, and create a new interdisciplinary scientific research organization. The first is to create a "characteristic" entity interdisciplinary scientific research organization. Colleges and universities should combine their advantageous discipline resources and technological innovation needs in key fields, efficiently aggregate the resources scattered in Colleges (disciplines), create a distinctive entity interdisciplinary scientific research organization at the school level, adopt an independent organizational system, overcome the barriers of traditional discipline organizations, and establish an organizational carrier for overall interdisciplinary research at the school level. The second is to create a "Task-based" virtual interdisciplinary scientific research organization. Colleges and universities can give full play to the advantages of multi-disciplinary resources and establish non entity interdisciplinary scientific research organizations. The virtual interdisciplinary research organization operates in the form of interdisciplinary project team, mainly undertaking national and regional major strategic projects and enterprise industry university research cooperation projects, and forming different interdisciplinary research teams based on project tasks. The "Task-based" virtual interdisciplinary scientific research organization is very flexible and can be dynamically adjusted according to the implementation of scientific research tasks. If the project tasks are completed, the team can be dissolved and a new team can be established according to the new project tasks. If new research topics are derived after the project tasks are completed to be solved, the interdisciplinary scientific research team can continue to carry out research. The mature "Task-based" virtual interdisciplinary scientific research organization can be built into a "characteristic" entity interdisciplinary scientific research organization. Second, strengthen system construction and ensure the operation of interdisciplinary research organizations. Interdisciplinary research organizations cannot operate effectively without appropriate system support. On the one hand, the national level should reform the orientation of external evaluation and strengthen institutional guidance. Optimize and improve the existing discipline evaluation mechanism, formulate the evaluation scheme of appropriate interdisciplinary and interdisciplinary research organizations in addition to discipline evaluation, reverse the academic orientation of the evaluation of scientific research achievements in Colleges and universities, and highlight the consideration of scientific research achievements in promoting the realization of national strategy, promoting economic and social development and promoting scientific and technological progress. At the same time, accelerate the establishment of the evaluation mechanism of interdisciplinary research results, explore and establish the system of organizing multidisciplinary experts in Colleges and universities to jointly evaluate interdisciplinary research results, formulate the national model of evaluation process and evaluation standards, and guide colleges and universities to establish corresponding evaluation systems. In addition, support the creation of a number of interdisciplinary journals and provide a community exchange platform for interdisciplinary researchers. On the other hand, colleges and universities should explore and build an institutional system suitable for interdisciplinary research organizations to provide institutional guarantee for teaching and scientific researchers to engage in interdisciplinary scientific research activities. Firstly, the school level formulates special interdisciplinary research achievement evaluation, workload calculation and professional title promotion systems for personnel engaged in interdisciplinary teaching and scientific research activities; Secondly, flexible appointment systems such as joint appointment are formulated for part-time personnel participating in interdisciplinary research, such as virtual interdisciplinary scientific research teams, so as to open up the connection channel between them and their original appointment system; Thirdly, establish a special construction subsidy and incentive system for interdisciplinary scientific research organizations, especially in the initial stage of the organization, provide financial support and incubation support in the form of seed fund, and provide supporting funds for interdisciplinary teams that win scientific research projects in key fields of national, regional and industrial enterprises. Third, promote the formation of interdisciplinary and cross-border organizational culture in Colleges and universities. In the new era, China's higher education reform should lead colleges and universities to realize the transformation and innovation of organizational culture with the new concept of quality and development. First, accelerate the construction of interdisciplinary disciplines in Colleges and universities, formulate special plans for interdisciplinary construction, promote the interdisciplinary integration of colleges and universities, gradually enrich the interdisciplinary system under interdisciplinary categories, expand the pilot scope of interdisciplinary disciplines, realize the compatibility and mutual promotion of multi-disciplinary cultures in Colleges and universities, and create an organizational atmosphere for discipline integration and innovation. Secondly, colleges and universities should shape external adaptability that actively meets the needs of national strategy, economic and social development, scientific and technological progress and the development of industrial enterprises
Edit：Yuanqi Tang Responsible editor：Xiao Yu
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