Some people think that Dong Shuheng's establishment of the Renaissance Society is completely unnecessary.
The current Huaihai Navy was founded by Dong Shuheng. Even if Dong Shuheng proclaimed himself emperor now, the people below him would support him.
But Dong Shuheng knew that things were not that simple.
Now these people are still in the start-up stage of their careers.
The Huaihai Navy was surrounded by enemies everywhere. Under such circumstances, everyone naturally united around Dong Shuheng. This was called grouping for warmth.
But what happens when the Manchu Qing Dynasty is overthrown? Will the Huaihai Navy still be able to maintain such purity by then?
Obviously it is impossible. When success comes, people will naturally have desires of one kind or another and have their own plans. This is called each seeking his or her own future.
At that time, all kinds of dirty and dirty things will appear one after another.
Therefore, Dong Shuheng felt that no matter whether it was an imperial system or a democracy in the future, there must be an organization to connect the people around him and pass on their aspirations to revitalize China.
As long as there are stumbling blocks that hinder China's development on this planet, China's footsteps will not stop. Their goal in the future may be the stars, the sea, or the vast universe.
Chinese people must have the ambition to lead the development of this planet.
A nation must be led by a group of the best people to move forward.
Similarly, a planet should be led by an outstanding nation to unite the strength of all mankind to jointly build our beautiful homeland.
Instead of being like some countries who only want to suck blood from other countries and nations to satisfy their own selfish desires.
The first meeting of the new revival meeting determined the leadership body of the revival meeting.
Dong Shuheng gave up the honor of being the first leader of the association to Wei Yuan.
The old man has been silently supporting himself from the beginning.
If Wei Yuan hadn't stood in front of Dong Shuheng when he was still weak.
Perhaps Dong Shuheng would have been strangled in his cradle long ago. The place Dong Shuheng returned to was developed Jiangsu, an endless plain area, where the Qing army and the Taiping army strangled.
He doesn't have the time or the conditions to slowly farm and develop like others. He has to grow as quickly as possible to a point where he can protect himself.
Just like a baby deer born in the wild must learn to run within five minutes; a baby crocodile born in the wild must learn to hunt as soon as it hatches.
Of course, there is another reason why Wei Yuan was appointed as the first leader of the New Renaissance Association.
There are still some elders in the revival church, and these people are like pillars of support.
Although they do not hold important administrative positions, they are masters of practical knowledge who are relatively scarce in the country.
With these people still there, it would be inappropriate for Dong Shuheng to be the leader.
However, Dong Shuheng still became the executive vice president and presided over the daily work of the revival meeting. Wei Yuan would definitely not be able to deal with these trivial matters.
Zuo Zongtang is also the vice-chairman. He is also considered one of the important elders, and he also holds real power.
At the same time, Zuo Zongtang will also be the leader of the Huguang branch.
Dong Shuheng also serves as the leader of the Liangjiang branch.
The meeting also determined the program of the new revival meeting and the direction of development in the next few years.
In the next few years, the Renaissance Association will focus on developing members in the Huaihai Navy, and will also establish its own branches in various provinces.
Dong Shuheng determined Huai Haijun's strategy of going global.
The Huai Navy is preparing to develop a group of young members. It will take advantage of the opportunities provided by the establishment of new armies in various provinces to go out and break into these new armies, secretly carry out activities, develop new members, and find like-minded people.
In addition, a group of members must return to their original provinces to develop the Fuxing Association organization and lay a good front line for the Huai Navy to occupy the area in the future.
Dong Shuheng knew that in later history, the New Army fought against the Qing Dynasty because many anti-Qing patriots broke into the New Army.
Of course, the current conditions of the Huai Navy are much better than those of the anti-Qing patriots in the past.
They have the powerful Huai Navy as their backing, and they will receive strong support from the Huai Navy in their actions. Their own safety will also be better protected.
After finishing his work at the revival meeting, Dong Shuheng started his university construction plan.
Just at this time, another batch of European scholars arrived at Haimen Port, and at the same time, some academy teachers who had been arranged to go out for exchanges came back.
Dong Shuheng was going to take a bigger step this time.
In addition to the newly established Jiangning Women's Normal College, Dong Shuheng plans to integrate the original academies in Jiangning, establish some natural science disciplines, and establish Jiangning Academy based on the model of Huaihai Academy.
Jiangxi was originally a place where humanities gathered, and Dong Shuheng planned to establish a Nanchang academy and a Ganzhou academy.
In Ningguo, Anhui Province, Huizhou used to be the area with the most developed humanities. A Huizhou Academy will be established here, Luzhou Academy will be established in northern Anhui, and a Polytechnic Institute will be established in Anqing.
Anqing will be built as a heavy industrial city on the middle reaches of the Yangtze River.
Dong Shuheng plans to call comprehensive universities academies and some professional universities colleges.
If it were to be renamed a university directly, many people would find it unacceptable. Even seniors like Wei Yuan and others thought it would be better to call it an academy.
Huaihai Academy was the result of their insistence. If Dong Shuheng had followed his wishes, it would have been called Huaihai University.
But it was just a title, Dong Shuheng didn't care, as long as he could cultivate talents for the country and the nation.
In this circle, there will be six major academies under the rule of Huai Haijun. In Shanghai, there is also St. John's University founded by missionaries. There are also some professional colleges, such as Normal College, Medical College, Law School, and Police College.
, School of Administration, etc.
Looking at it this way, the schools under Huai Haijun are expanding a bit too fast. Where do the teachers come from? Where do the students come from?
Dong Shuheng himself also felt that it was too hasty now. After such a rollout, the original teaching staff of Huaihai Academy would be diluted.
This situation can be alleviated only after the talents cultivated by the academy have grown up and the international students have returned.
However, he still decided to establish these academies first. They could be smaller in scale, but as long as they existed, they would be able to grow slowly.
Dong Shuheng does not believe that Huaihai Academy alone can support the talent demand of the entire China. Moreover, it is just an academy without competition, which is not conducive to the development of Huaihai Academy.
In these newly established academies, Dong Shuheng will continue to employ the original academy teachers and teach the Four Books and Five Classics. However, Dong Shuheng will let them imitate the Huaihai Academy and add some new subjects.
There is nothing wrong with studying the Four Books and Five Classics. These knowledge are also the inheritance of Chinese wisdom. The problem is that you cannot just study these contents.
The establishment of the new academy was supported by Wei Yuan. He believed that the Huaihai Navy should be an inclusive force. Since it chose to combine the East and the West and the knowledge of the East and the West, it could not just introduce it from outside.
Now Huaihai Navy has done a lot in introducing Western knowledge. Whether it is directly introducing talents or translating and publishing books, it has done very well.
However, the inheritance of Chinese culture was not done well. There were few people in the Huaihai Navy who could be called masters of Confucianism.
Is it that Confucianism has no value to China today?
Obviously this is not the case. Although the Confucian education model has gone astray, it has not lost its value.
Dong Shuheng has no bias in learning, he simply hopes that Chinese learning will be richer.
The problem with Confucianism is that it is no longer inclusive and does not absorb new knowledge. It just blindly interprets the original meaning of the classics.
This leads to some explanations that are completely deviated from the original meaning of Confucianism.
The Confucian classics before the Han Dynasty were inclusive of hundreds of schools of thought. Later we saw that all the schools of thought were lost. That was because many people from the hundreds of schools of thought joined Confucianism.
Because Confucianism has been recognized by the emperor, only by joining the Confucian camp can it be reused.
At that time, the thoughts and knowledge of hundreds of schools of thought were not cut off.
Therefore, Dong Shuheng hopes that Confucianism can re-enter the road of embracing all rivers.
In the newly established academies, not only the students had to accept new knowledge, but also the great Confucian scholars who studied the classics and meanings also had to accept the baptism of new knowledge.
Dong Shuheng believes that those inheritors of Chinese national quintessence will not live up to his expectations and they will definitely make changes.
Since ancient times, Confucianism has been very utilitarian, and they have made countless changes in order to cater to the needs of imperial rule.
Then they will definitely make changes for themselves.
From August to September, Dong Shuheng has been traveling in the three provinces below Liangjiang. He has visited almost all the famous academies.
Most academies are willing to accept Huai Haijun's reforms.
Because Dong Shuheng promised to guarantee their school funding and promised to help them build new college buildings.
This made the old gentlemen unable to refuse. Originally, these academies mostly relied on private donations and tuition fees to maintain their operations.
Therefore, their lives are tight every day.
Especially with the chaos in the south in recent years, many academies have lost their financial resources and even their husbands can no longer afford to support them. At this time, Dong Shuheng found them as a timely help.
Don't regard ancient literati as old antiques who don't know how to adapt.
In fact, they all deeply understand the meaning of the saying "He who knows the current affairs is a hero".
Finally, Dong Shuheng also organized a group of academy representatives to visit Huaihai Academy. They saw the grandeur of Huaihai Academy.
These academy representatives were immediately excited. Such an academy that blends in with the pastoral scenery and is majestic at the same time is what they have dreamed of.
And if they have full funding from the government, then their education is considered a government school.
Dong Shuheng also promised that as long as they train talents according to Huai Haijun's requirements, after the academy's students graduate, Huai Haijun will arrange jobs according to their abilities.
Nowadays, we are far from the days when undergraduates were everywhere and graduate students were as numerous as dogs.
Dong Shuheng is short of talent, a serious shortage of talent. He is so short of talent that he could clearly occupy more territory, but because he lacks people to manage it, he doesn't dare to occupy it now.
After completely occupying the two rivers this time, Huai Haijun promoted a large number of military government officials from Jiangsu. Many of the officials who were in charge of a town went directly to Anhui and Jiangxi to take charge of a county.
It is indeed a bit of a pushback. But only by letting these people go can Dong Shuheng feel relieved. Only they can implement Huai Haijun's policy.
Recently, Huai Haijun has selected a group of students from Huai Hai Academy to train in the military government at the grassroots level.
Most of these students are the older ones in the academy. The ancients did not give up studying when they got old, unlike the people of later generations. If there were no age restrictions in Huaihai Academy, some old students in their sixties or seventies might still be recruited.
Most of the students sent to local areas by these academies were around thirty years old. They entered the academies in the first place because they liked practical learning, and some of them were attracted by Wei Yuan's reputation.
In fact, more people feel that the imperial examination is hopeless.
Now, they are expected to directly become officials, how can we not make them extremely happy?