From July 25 to 30, the final of the 13th National Metallographic Skills Competition for College Students was held in Huanggang Normal College, Hubei Province. Wang Qianhong and Ding Junguo from College of Intelligent Manufacturing were awarded the first and second prizes of the competition respectively. The competition was hosted by the Teaching Guidance Committee for Materials Majors in Higher Educational Institutions of Ministry of Education and undertaken by Huanggang Normal College. 1,898 participants from 531 colleges and universities across China, including Tsinghua University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Guangxi University.

Huang Wei and Huang Zhaoyin, two teachers from College of Intelligent Manufacturing of Nanning University, led their students to participate in the competition. Participants drew two of the three samples from the 20 steel (high-quality low-carbon structural steel), industrial pure iron and ductile iron as the final samples by drawing lots during the competition, and then completed the preparation of the two samples within three days in accordance with the competition rules. For the designated metal samples, participants are required to complete the grinding, polishing, and etching processes on the designated end faces within 30 minutes, and finally prepare clean, flat, and microstructures that can be clearly observed under the metallurgical microscope for the judges to score. The judges evaluated the experimental skills of participants in terms of metallographic image quality, cleanliness of the observation surface, and flatness of the observation surface, in combination with the operating habits during the competition.

To promote teaching and learning through competition, and to improve students’ operational and professional skills, artistic aesthetics and scientific literacy. In the future, Nanning University will further cultivate the craftsmanship spirit of persistent concentration, improvement, meticulousness, and pursuit of excellence among engineering students, and improve the quality of training applied talents.

Two participating students with the instructor.

Awarded students Wang Qianhong and Ding Junguo.