UIC teams celebrated victory in the Guangdong Provincial Competition of the 10th National College Student "Innovation, Creativity and Entrepreneurship" Competition 2020. The competition was held online from 19 July to 26 July.
The participating UIC students and supervisors achieved fantastic results by earning an Outstanding Winner Prize, two second prizes and a third prize, and the Excellent Supervisor Award.
'Yilan Culture' team in Guizhou
The ‘Innovation, Creativity and Entrepreneurship’ Competition is divided into three levels: College level, Provincial level and National level. The competition aims to stimulate the interest and potential of college students, and cultivates college students' sense of innovation, creative thinking, entrepreneurship and teamwork spirit.
There were 51 colleges registered in the Guangdong Provincial Competition in 2020, with a total of 1,345 participating teams, and more than 7,200 participants. After being screened by college competitions, 272 teams were shortlisted for the primary competition for Guangdong province. The UIC internal selection of the competition was organised by the Division of Business and Management (DBM) during June 2020. A total of 20 teams took part in the internal selection and seven teams were selected. Teams were composed of students from all Divisions of UIC, even from other universities. Among them, the ‘Yilan Culture’ project team won the provincial Outstanding Winner Prize, while DBM Assistant Professor, Dr Karen Lee, and Director of Four-Point Education Coordination Office (FPECO), Ms Jennifer Lin, won the award for Excellent Supervisors.
Rejuvenating traditional culture of dyeing
The members of Yilan Culture come from four divisions and are composed of sophomores and juniors majoring in Accounting, Media Arts and Design, Public Relations and Advertising, and Financial Mathematics. Students from various majors collaborated in areas such as market development, brand management, media operations, and financial management.
In 2019, the team conducted a lecture in Zhuhai to promote intangible cultural heritages
Yang Jiang, who is an Accounting student and Team Leader, explained that China is the country with the largest number of intangible cultural heritages in the world. Many regions have accumulated profound traditional culture and he believes students can use their knowledge to tap the commercial value of traditional culture.
The team first aimed at the batik technique from Southeast Guizhou province, using natural dye extracted from the leaves of certain plants, with the goal of "breaking the limitations of intangible cultural heritage and bringing traditional blue dyeing culture into modern life".
The team visited traditional villages of ethnic minority settlements in the southeast Guizhou and Yunnan and found that the inconvenient transportation conditions in the mountainous areas caused a series of dilemmas such as the inability of these ethnic minorities culture to spread.
The local environment and climate provided good production conditions for the plants, which was conducive to low-cost production of blue dye products. They worked with local craftsmen and combined different intangible cultural heritage techniques to develop cultural creative products based on local cultural background and traditional stories.
Team members learning about the traditional culture and designs of the locals in Guizhou
The team linked the craftsmen as well as the craftsmen and consumers. This project provides innovative product design solutions and labour opportunities for intangible heritage and showcases to consumers the charm and creativity of the traditional culture while establishing new sales channels connecting traditional craftsmen and consumers.
The team studied the works of the locals in Guizhou
The team also organised classes and experiential workshops in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area teaching various techniques of indigo dyeing for groups with potential interest in intangible cultural heritage. They have also organised a large intangible cultural heritage exhibition with the theme of indigo dyeing in Zhuhai.
Exhibition
Yang Jiang explained that they hope to attract more young people through cultural creation so that society can embrace traditional culture. This Provincial Outstanding Winner Prize greatly encouraged the team to formally transform and look at themselves as true entrepreneurs.
DBM Assistant Professor and supervisor of 'Yilan Culture', Dr Karen Lee, said that UIC's Whole Person Education allows students to develop their teamwork and leadership skills in an all-round way, which is an important factor for the success of the team.
Yang Jiang presenting their project
Another supervisor, Ms Jennifer Lin, expressed her appreciation that the members of the team genuinely care about the public benefit and acted through their cultural enterprise as a way to rejuvenate intangible cultural heritages.
For this competition, DBM had invited 5 internal adjudicators and 2 external adjudicators for the Internal Selection. They were: Dean of DBM Prof Stella Cho, Associate Professor and Programme Director of Accounting Mr Joseph Liang, DBM Associate Professor Dr May Wang, DBM Assistant Professors Dr Keng Hong Ng and Dr Tiger Xiao, as well as external adjudicators Mr Wang Zhenliang and Mr Wu Jun.
From MPRO
Reporters: Samuel Burgess, Covee Wang
Editor: Deen He
