On March 28 and 29, Minister of Education Chen Baosheng visited several higher education institutions in Chongqing, including Southwest University, Chongqing Three Gorges Medical College and Chongqing Three Gorges University. A symposium was held at the same time to discuss education reforms in the Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster of the Yangtze River Delta Economic Zone, on which a total of 14 representatives from local government, higher education institutions and enterprises exchanged views.

During the symposium Chen mentioned the national strategy for developing the Yangtze River Economic Zone and stressed its crucial importance. A new blueprint for the education sector was mapped out to boost the implementation of this strategy. He called for further integration of education in the Zone, and developing an education innovation cluster, so as to build a broader pool of high quality professionals and to optimize the use of educational resources.