Report by Guo Xiaoxia from the Open University of China (OUC): On December 27th 2009, the OUC held the Launching Meeting of "the National Projects Supported by Science and Technology" and "the Training Programme of Psychological Disease Control and Research and Development Project on Continuing Education Resources". The objectives of the meeting were to explore the cooperative model of production, education and research on training in

psychological disease control and continuing education between the radio and TV universities and the experts, academic institutes and associations in the psychological field, to launch the projects approved by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), to research and develop course series including text, video and web-based multi- media teaching resources, as well as to build a training platform for academic institutes and associations and a learning platform for mental health promotion of various social groups, aiming at making greater contributions to training talents of counseling and psychotherapy and the improvement of public mental health. Twenty-three psychologists from renowned universities in China, CPC Committee Secretary Ruan Zhiyong and Vice President Li Linshu of the OUC and leaders from relevant departments attended the meeting.

Mr. Ruan Zhiyong gave a brief introduction about the OUC at the meeting. After that, he pointed out that the project attracted so many experts from the national psychological circle in a concerted effort to research and develop resources and to explore new model of staff training within a unified system, and platforms with rich resources. Radio and TV universities had the advantages of pooling excellent teachers and systematic operational practice. We would go all out to join hands with the experts, provide good services and back up their work to the best of our capability.

Professor Yang Yunping, Director of Psychological Department from Beijing Anding Hospital, a subsidiary hospital of the Capital University of Medical Science, introduced the background and the significance of the cooperation with the OUC, the MOST projects and the related organizational frameworks, the orientation and function of courses and the working progress.

Li Linshu gave a speech at the invitation of the experts. He said that the cooperative projects gathered the strength of such an excellent team from the national psychological field, which was both a great opportunity and a challenge to the OUC. When implementing the project, the OUC would give priority to the following three tasks. The first was to deliver good services. During the implementation of the project, the OUC would commit itself to the services of "threading the needle" (doing a good job of liaison) for all the experts and operations. The second was to make use of the exclusive OU educational system to carry out every experiment and exploration in the process. The third was to build platforms. One was for the research and development of resources. The radio and TV universities were favored with unique advantages and the national level capability in the resources research and development for the continuing education of the active workers. Another platform was for training. This platform would provide a training model based on the resources available, taking the distance into consideration. The OUC hoped to work together with the experts present at the meeting to make exploration of innovative models, to provide good services, to build platforms and to establish pilot work on training staff, sparing no effort in pushing forward the project.

The wonderful speeches delivered by the OUC leaders and experts were well received by the representatives at the meeting. It was agreed that the cooperation was of great importance, which would positively guide the staff training work in psychological disease control, accelerate the training process, and promote the public mental health. The experts have also made detailed discussions on types of resources, course names, and lead teachers, as well as the training and continuing education of the psychiatric teams and the counseling professionals in higher educational institutions and communities. It was learned after the meeting that a steering committee of project resources building and a working committee of project resources building would be established, and the specific content and progress of each task would be fixed later.

By Guo Xiaoxia, the OUC