Civil engineering majors were once in the limelight and were the mainstay of the national infrastructure and real estate industry, and Tongji University, as a 985 university, is even more famous in the world. However, with the change of the times, civil engineering majors have gradually lost their former glory, employment is no longer so optimistic, and salaries are no longer so attractive. In order to recover the decline of civil engineering majors, Tongji University has launched a personalized talent training model of "civil engineering". This model not only includes major professional courses, but also involves interdisciplinary disciplines with other majors, and strives to cultivate more comprehensive interdisciplinary talents to meet the needs and development trends of the times.
Tongji University's "civil engineering" personalized talent training model breaks through the traditional model of civil engineering professional talent training, no longer blindly emphasizing the further study of a single discipline, but opens up a road of cross-integration with other majors. Students can choose to study in seven modules, including construction engineering, underground construction engineering, geotechnical engineering, bridge engineering, road engineering, rail transit engineering, engineering disaster prevention and risk assessment, which expands the breadth and depth of the major. At the same time, the jointly offered majors such as "Mathematics and Physics Intensive Class", "Mechanics Experimental Class" and "Innovation and Entrepreneurship Class" provide students with more interdisciplinary opportunities and cultivate talents with more practical ability and innovative thinking.
The "Civil-Law" Compound Talent Experimental Class jointly established with the School of Law provides students majoring in civil engineering with a supplement and expansion of legal knowledge, and cultivates compound talents to deal with increasingly frequent legal cases in the field of real estate. With the gradual standardization of China's real estate industry and the continuous improvement of laws and regulations, the demand for such compound talents will increase day by day. However, this also requires candidates to have stronger learning and adaptability, as well as more comprehensive legal education support from schools.
Although Tongji University has tried to recover the decline of civil engineering majors by launching the "civil engineering" personalized talent training model, it is not easy to truly change the employment status quo of civil engineering majors from the perspective of practical results. Except for the "Civil-Law" compound talent experimental class, other cooperation and interdisciplinary disciplines have not jumped out of the framework of civil engineering majors, and the scope of employment has not been fundamentally expanded. In the context of the current trough of the entire civil engineering industry, whether students can find their dream jobs after graduation is still a question worth thinking about and paying attention to. Civil engineering majors have a long academic period, and adding other majors may make the knowledge too broad rather than in-depth, so it is necessary for schools and students to work together to avoid the "layman" effect.
As a comprehensive university, Tongji University should conform to the trend of the times and reasonably adjust the major setting and talent training mode according to the market demand. In the case that civil engineering majors are no longer popular, it is necessary to appropriately reduce the number of students enrolled and allocate resources to professional fields with more potential and demand, so as to better meet the needs of society. In addition, the university can also learn from the practices of other universities, such as Tsinghua University's decision to withdraw from the first batch of civil engineering enrollment, focusing on the development of basic strategic disciplines needed by the country, and injecting more vitality into the development of disciplines.
The "civil engineering" training model of Tongji University is an attempt and exploration of the current predicament of civil engineering majors, but in order to truly recover the decline, it is still necessary for the university, students and society to work together to realize the organic integration of talent training, and to deal with future challenges with more flexible and diversified thinking.