Exploring the Industry-Academia Co-Creation Model for Graduate Education in Sector-Specific Universities: Evidence from Harbin Engineering University’s Practice

Under the framework of emerging graduate education models, Industry-Academia Co-Creation Model (IACM) significantly enhances graduate students’ innovative capabilities and industry relevance. This study takes Harbin Engineering University as an example to propose a collaborative innovation framework for graduate education, grounded in the Emerging Engineering Education paradigm. Through critical analysis of the limitations inherent in the traditional graduate training model and the imperative for IACM, we propose four IACM pathways for graduate students’ training, comprising dual-advisor system, university-enterprise joint development of training programs & curriculum system, industry-university-research-application (IURA) collaboration platform and quality-centric evaluation metrics. These strategies cultivate “theory-application integration” competencies in graduate students, achieving dual objectives of elevating the quality of talent development in universities and addressing industry demands for real-world engineering solutions, thereby in line with the evolution of modern higher education.