Time flies and the second cohort of students are going to graduate from Guangdong Technion - Israel Institute of Technology (GTIIT) this year. We will present a series of interviews with the graduates from the Class of 2022, to show their stories at GTIIT in the past four years.

Here is the story of Gao Jiajie, a student of the Class of 2022 from the Materials Science and Engineering Program.

A Successful Investment

Same as most high school graduates, Gao felt confused when applying to university. All he knew was that he had a strong desire to learn about science and engineering. It was then that a friend of his father, a parent of a GTIIT student of the 2017 cohort, introduced him about GTIIT, a newly built Sino-foreign university focusing on science and engineering. Gao decided to go to GTIIT with an excellent Gaokao score.

Gao Winning Prize for His Class

Why did Gao choose GTIIT? He laughed and said that he preferred to regard it as an “investment”. GTIIT attracted him with world-class teaching and faculty, even there were only 200 students in 2018. Textbooks here are the same as the ones in Cambridge and Oxford, the top universities. Professors will guide the students to read the latest academic journals. “The most advanced knowledge, including textbooks and papers, is all written in English. If you want to learn in Chinese, then you will have to wait for the translations, which takes time. But in GTIIT, I can have the chance to reach a higher academic platform.”

The young man's “investment”proved to be successful. Gao became the top one among the students in his program, and received offers from top universities including ETH Zurich, EPFL, Cornell University and Columbia University.

A Freestyle Research

GTIIT offers freedom to students in learning, living, and researching, but not everyone can perform a perfect “freestyle” in the freedom. After four year’s practice, Gao gave his resolution: learn how to learn by himself.

Gao Playing Snowboard

Math homework is the very first challenge for most GTIIT freshmen. “For all day I could only finish one or two questions, but I would hold on for several days until getting all done,” but Gao knew that this was not the only way, “Learn how to solve the problem is also an important part of self-learning ability.” Different from waiting for the teachers to give the lecture and answer, Gao will try to solve by asking the professors, discussing with the teammates and searching the related knowledge in YouTube and Google. Every time he got interested in a field, he would dive into it, trying to solve every question he met.

"We used to solve the problems with a compulsory routine to get a higher score in the Gaokao exam, but in the research world, it does not make sense. Researcher’s way is more innovative. In the process, you may find new problems and try to solve them freely and creatively. This is much more interesting, even sometimes boring because of things like repeated measurement. Even in the most mundane measurement, you can still find some things to take initiative. For example, asking yourself if there's a flaw, or if there's something else you hadn’t taken into account. The active thinking, as opposed to passive learning, has trained my thinking way and my mind has become more active and open-minded."

Gao in Karting Race

In this way, Gao realized his love and goal for scientific research. He decided to further his study in nano electronics and semi-conductor, and has received offers from the related program in prestigious universities.

An Exchange of Ideas

Looking back to the past four years, Gao was most impressed by "GTIIT Fun Class", a teaching practice program jointly organized by GTIIT and Shantou Dongxia Middle School, in which 14 GTIIT students managed to bring the interesting bilingual knowledge to the middle school students.

Gao Working as Volunteers to Welcome Freshmen

Learning by doing, Gao has a rich university life in GTIIT. “Four years ago, I never expected I can get offers from top universities and work with the top talents. I would like to appreciate what GTIIT had given me. Wish I can stay true to my original aspiration to meet a wider world!”