Rural Revitali-zation Practice

During the summer vacation of 2022, I led a volunteer team consisting of 18 college students from 8 different universities to carry out rural revitalization practice activities in Xiangxiang City, Hunan Province, China.

In ten days, we completed 2 research reports, 1 school interior renovation design, 2 outdoor playground designs, 9 cultural and creative product designs, and organized 3 study tour manuals.

As the team leader, I participated in a practice activity for the first time, from team recruitment, itinerary arrangement, government docking to the specific implementation of the practice. Although there are still many aspects that are not well thought out and not well taken care of, it has indeed trained my comprehensive abilities in organization and coordination.

At the same time, I am also a member of the architectural planning group. My main task is to work with members to investigate the local abandoned school, conduct a comprehensive analysis of the site status, and combine the needs of the local villagers’ activity center and the red training school to design and transform the abandoned school into a “multi-purpose school”. That is, it can be used as a rural revitalization university practice base during winter and summer vacations, and can be used as an activity center for nearby villagers and a red training school during ordinary times.

This ten-day practice has yielded a lot for me. First, “knowledge from books is always shallow, and one must practice to truly understand.” This practice gave me the opportunity to truly face to face with local governments and relevant people in charge of scenic areas, allowing me to see that there is a huge gap between design and practice.

What’s more, this practice has allowed me to truly experience the “hollowing out” and “aging” issues in rural areas. Although our country has achieved comprehensive poverty alleviation, how to effectively prevent the formerly poor households from returning to poverty and how to provide them with a sustainable source of life and work is still a major problem in rural development.