Guangzhou Vocational School of Tourism and Business (hereinafter referred to as "Guangzhou Tourism & Business Vocational School") has maintained a long-term, stable, and in-depth collaboration with the Guangzhou White Swan Hotel, the first large-scale modern five-star hotel in New China, in the field of High-Star Hotel Operation and Management since 1981. Together, they have forged a partnership spanning over four decades, ultimately establishing a domestic model for industry-education integration and school-enterprise cooperation in the realm of vocational education. In the past decade, both parties have achieved significant outcomes by forming an industry-education integration community and establishing the White Swan Management Trainee Program (hereinafter referred to as the "White Swan Program") to cultivate high-quality skilled talents for the modern service industry. These efforts have substantially enhanced the core competitiveness and brand image of both the school and the enterprise. Currently, aligning with the national strategic plan for home-school-community collaborative education, the White Swan Program, underpinned by a family occupational resource empowerment mechanism and utilizing the "Home-School-Community Collaborative Education Ecosystem" as a platform, has innovatively activated the "family power" in vocational education. This approach supports the realization of the goal of "comprehensive immersion of home, school, and community" in vocational education talent development. It provides an operable and replicable model for secondary vocational schools in the Greater Bay Area to deepen industry-education integration, demonstrating significant exemplary effects and promotional value.

Introduction

Research Background and Problem Identification

    In October 2021, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress of China adopted the Family Education Promotion Law of the People's Republic of China, marking the first time in China's legal history that family education was explicitly defined with the fundamental task of cultivating individuals with virtue and integrity, and mandating the establishment of a collaborative education mechanism among families, schools, and communities (Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, 2021). A year later, in November 2022, the state issued another significant document concerning the systematic construction of a home-school-community collaborative education mechanism. Specifically, the Opinions on Improving the Mechanism for Collaborative Education among Schools, Families, and Society was jointly issued by 13 departments, including the Ministry of Education. (Ministry of Education, Publicity Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, 2023). This document explicitly proposed the establishment of a tripartite responsibility division system, with schools taking the lead, families fulfilling their responsibilities, and communities providing support. It emphasized the necessity of strengthening the integration of industry and education, as well as fostering cognitive synergy between families and vocational education institutions. Consequently, home-school-community collaborative education has emerged as a vital national strategy in China, representing an inherent pursuit for fulfilling the fundamental task of nurturing talent with moral integrity and an inevitable choice for promoting students' holistic and healthy development. This strategy carries significant theoretical implications and practical value (Shao & Luo, 2025). 

    Currently, the absence of family involvement in vocational education has given rise to three prominent issues: Firstly, parents' low recognition of vocational education and communication barriers between parents and children hinder the formation of students' occupational values. Secondly, the underdevelopment of family occupational resources leaves a wealth of potential educational assets, such as parents' workplace experiences and professional networks, largely untapped, exacerbating the structural imbalance between industry and educational resources. Thirdly, a severe lack of family-based career planning leads to pronounced generational gaps in occupational awareness, leaving students with confused career goals and weak motivation for professional development (Xue, 2024). In response to the aforementioned contradictions, the "White Swan Program" at Guangzhou Vocational School of Tourism and Business, rooted in the core vocational education philosophy of integrating industry with education and supported by a family occupational resource empowerment mechanism, has innovatively activated family occupational genes. It has established an "ecosystem for collaborative education among home, school, and community" with profound family participation, organically integrating resources from these three sectors. This approach injects sustainable family occupational momentum into class culture development, social practice implementation, and diversified collaborative assessments, thereby facilitating the realization of the goal of "comprehensive immersion of home, school, and community" in vocational education talent cultivation. It serves as a model for secondary vocational schools in the Greater Bay Area, demonstrating strong exemplary significance and potential for widespread replication in fulfilling the requirements outlined in the Opinions on Improving the Collaborative Education Mechanism Among Schools, Families, and Society, which calls for "establishing a tripartite responsibility division system led by schools, fulfilled by families, and supported by society."

Research Objectives and Significance

    This study focuses on the "White Swan Program" at Guangzhou Tourism & Business Vocational School, aiming to delve into how it constructs a home-school-community collaborative education mechanism by effectively activating the "family power" in vocational education and evaluates the effectiveness of this mechanism in collaborative education. Currently, China's vocational education faces common challenges such as low parental recognition of vocational education, insufficient development of family occupational resources, and a lack of family career planning. As a key educational entity, the role of families has long been underemphasized and underdeveloped in the field of vocational education. This study attempts to analyze how the "White Swan Program" breaks through the traditional framework of school-enterprise cooperation by deeply integrating the family dimension into the ecosystem of talent cultivation in vocational education. This approach forms a closed-loop collaborative education system where the school plays a leading role, the family assumes primary responsibility, and society provides major support, thereby addressing the core question of "how to effectively activate family power to enhance the quality of education in vocational settings." By dissecting its practical pathways and multidimensional outcomes, this study is dedicated to providing actionable empirical references for resolving the current pain points in vocational education talent development.

    This study holds significant theoretical value and practical implications. At the theoretical level, it enriches the connotations of collaborative education theory in vocational education by breaking through the limitations of previous research, which predominantly focused on dual collaborations between "schools and enterprises" or "schools and communities." Instead, it attempts to elevate "family power" to a ternary collaborative dimension of equal importance alongside schools and society, constructing an analytical framework for the deep integration of home, school, and community. This provides a new perspective for understanding the complex interactions within the collaborative education ecosystem in vocational education. At the practical level, the home-school-community collaborative education ecosystem and the family occupational resource empowerment mechanism developed in this study possess broad applicability and operational feasibility, with practical implications manifesting in three key aspects. Firstly, it serves as a model for vocational colleges to innovate their talent cultivation models, demonstrating how institutionalized designs can effectively mobilize parental enthusiasm and transform their perceptions and modes of participation in vocational education. Secondly, it offers new insights for enterprises to deepen industry-education integration, showing that proactive efforts by enterprises to showcase their development platforms and cultures to parents can bolster family confidence in their children's career choices, thereby stabilizing high-quality student enrollments and improving talent retention rates. Thirdly, it provides a basis for policymakers to optimize the governance system of vocational education, highlighting the necessity of incorporating family support into evaluation indicators for modern apprenticeship systems or order-based training programs. Ultimately, through empirical data, this study validates the pivotal role of "family power" in enhancing students' professional identity, skill competencies, and employment quality, offering a grounded and effective solution for promoting high-quality development in vocational education within the context of the Greater Bay Area's secondary vocational schools.

Research Methodology and Case Selection

    This study adopts a case study approach within the qualitative research paradigm, focusing on the "White Swan Management Trainee Program" jointly conducted by Guangzhou Vocational School of Tourism and Business and Guangzhou White Swan Hotel. The case study method is particularly well-suited for in-depth exploration of complex phenomena and their underlying mechanisms within specific contexts. Its core strength lies in its ability to investigate and provide rich descriptions of "how" and "why" questions, along with the reasons behind them, in real-world settings through cross-validation of multi-source evidence, thereby facilitating theoretical construction (Li & Mao, 2015). The selection of the "White Swan Program" at Guangzhou Tourism & Business Vocational School as the research subject is grounded in its suitability as an ideal vehicle for exploring the home-school-community collaborative education mechanism in vocational education and its effectiveness in activating "family power."

    Specifically, the case selected for this study exhibits remarkable typicality and representativeness. Firstly, Guangzhou Tourism & Business Vocational School is a national key vocational school and one of the first batch of national demonstration schools for the reform and development of secondary vocational education. Its major in High-Star Hotel Service and Management, as a founding program of the school, boasts strong educational capabilities and enjoys high prestige and influence within the vocational education sector of the Greater Bay Area and even across the nation, making its experiences of certain demonstration value. Secondly, its partner, Guangzhou White Swan Hotel, stands as the first Sino-foreign cooperative five-star hotel established after China's reform and opening-up, serving as an industry benchmark and a representative of national hotel brands. Its profound involvement in vocational education inherently carries significant brand influence and industry-leading attributes. More crucially, the school-enterprise collaboration between Guangzhou Tourism & Business Vocational School and Guangzhou White Swan Hotel originated in the 1980s and has persisted for over four decades, marking an unparalleled depth and breadth of cooperation among domestic vocational institutions. Consequently, the "White Swan Program" is not a short-term pilot initiative but rather the culmination of years of sustained practice and iterative optimization by both the school and the enterprise. From its initial stages as evening classes and short-term training programs to subsequent customized classes and the current management trainee program, it has evolved into a relatively mature operational system with a stable collaborative ecosystem. Currently, the "White Swan Program" has been steadily implemented across four cohorts, effectively ensuring the stability of the research subject and the reliability of the experiences. The most distinctive feature of this program lies in its breakthrough from the traditional "school-enterprise dual" cooperation framework by systematically integrating the resources and influence of students' families—namely, family power—into the entire process of talent cultivation in vocational education. It is committed to constructing a ternary collaborative education model where "the school plays a leading role, the family assumes primary responsibility, and society serves as a major support." This innovative practice constitutes the core focus of this study. Meanwhile, the program has achieved remarkable outcomes in terms of talent cultivation quality, students' career stability (such as high retention rates and low turnover rates), enterprise satisfaction, and parental recognition, providing a solid empirical foundation for analysis and reference.

    To ensure the reliability and validity of the research, this study extensively collected detailed primary and secondary data through diversified channels, striving to construct a comprehensive "evidence triangle." The primary data primarily includes: (1) In-depth interview records: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with key participants, encompassing school administrators (such as vice principals in charge and program heads), core teachers and class advisors of the "White Swan Program," human resources managers and corporate mentors from Guangzhou White Swan Hotel, current and graduated student representatives of the program, as well as parent representatives actively involved in the project. The focus was on understanding the perspectives, experiences, and evaluations of all parties regarding the collaborative education mechanism. (2) Participatory and non-participatory observation records: The researchers organized and participated in significant events of the management trainee program (such as Parent Open Days, Corporate Experience Days, and Periodic Achievement Presentations) and the daily teaching management process through on-site visits. They documented the specific contexts, details, and atmospheres of home-school-community interactions. (3) Questionnaire survey data: Questionnaires were distributed to students and parents of the "White Swan Program" to quantitatively collect their perceived data on aspects such as satisfaction with the program, their own levels of participation, changes in professional identity, and the effectiveness of communication. Secondary data primarily encompasses: (1) Project documents of the "White Swan Program": These include the collaboration agreement, talent cultivation plan, teaching schedule, management regulations, parent notification letters, activity plans, and meeting minutes, among others. (2) Achievement materials: These consist of award certificates from student skill competitions, corporate commendation documents, case studies of outstanding graduates, media reports, and project summary reports, etc. (3) Relevant archival records: These involve student internship evaluation forms, employment tracking data, and parent feedback collection forms, among others. Through cross-analysis and integration of the aforementioned multi-source and multi-type data, this study endeavors to comprehensively, objectively, and profoundly reconstruct the practical landscape of home-school-community collaborative education within the "White Swan Program." It aims to unveil the underlying logic and key elements in activating "family power" in vocational education, thereby providing scientific and robust empirical support for theoretical construction and practical promotion.

Case Background: Overview of the "White Swan Program"

    This study selects the "White Swan Program" as the case for research, which was established in response to the profound transformations in the hotel industry and the strategic consensus between the school and the enterprise. With the upgrading of the cultural and tourism industry in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and the surge in demand for talent in high-end service sectors, particularly high-star hotels, industry-leading enterprises such as Guangzhou White Swan Hotel are confronted with a structural shortage of high-quality, highly stable frontline service personnel and management talent. Traditional recruitment models struggle to meet their stringent requirements for employees' cultural alignment, professional skills, and service philosophies. Meanwhile, Guangzhou Tourism & Business Vocational School, as a national key vocational institution, has consistently strived to explore effective approaches to enhance talent cultivation quality and employment compatibility. While its major in High-Star Hotel Operation and Management boasts a long-standing history and a solid foundation, there remains significant room for improvement in deepening industry-education integration and strengthening students' career commitment. Against this backdrop, the two parties initiated a strategic collaboration in 2021, jointly establishing the "White Swan Program" through enterprise-ordered talent cultivation. Currently, the program has been steadily operating for four cohorts. The talent development objectives of this specialized program are precisely aligned with the demands for team leader and supervisor positions in frontline service roles at Guangzhou White Swan Hotel. It aims to cultivate reserve management talent equipped with robust professional skills in hotel service and management, exceptional vocational qualities (including service awareness, communication skills, adaptability, and teamwork abilities), profound corporate cultural identity, and a high degree of career loyalty. The overarching goal is to achieve "highly compatible employment, high-quality retention, and high-potential development" for graduates

    The operation of the "White Swan Program" begins with a rigorous student selection process at the start of enrollment and spans the entire three-year secondary vocational education, embodying the distinct vocational education characteristic of "dual-subject education with full-process integration." After new students enroll, a joint school-enterprise assessment (including interviews and comprehensive quality evaluations) is conducted to select outstanding students from all students in the Hotel Management Department to form the "White Swan Program" cohort. The program follows the conventional three-year secondary vocational education system but implements a teaching strategy of "alternating work and study with progressive skill development." Compared to other classes, students in the "White Swan Program" have more industry practice and enterprise-based courses, along with joint school-enterprise mentors. Notably, the curriculum system of the "White Swan Program" is jointly developed by both the school and the enterprise, deeply integrating the service standards, management processes, and corporate culture essence of the White Swan Hotel. In addition to the nationally mandated professional foundational and core courses, a substantial number of customized modular courses are offered, such as White Swan Service Philosophy and Practice, High-End Customer Relationship Management, and Hotel Supervision Practice, aiming to integrate the enterprise's personalized employment needs into the school's curriculum system. Furthermore, the teaching arrangement of the "White Swan Program" emphasizes the close integration of theory and practice. First-year students complete foundational skill enhancement and cultural immersion at on-campus training bases, while second and third-year students are arranged for multiple rounds of progressive enterprise training and on-the-job internships, jointly guided by campus instructors and enterprise mentors (composed of senior supervisors or technical experts from the White Swan Hotel). In terms of faculty allocation, a "dual-mentor system" is implemented, wherein each student is assigned a dedicated mentor for moral education and career development to provide comprehensive guidance throughout their vocational growth journey. This model represents an in-depth practice of the modern apprenticeship system within the realm of secondary vocational education. Its distinctive feature lies in the integration of enterprise employment standards into the entire talent cultivation chain from an early stage, achieving a seamless transition characterized by "enrolling students as if recruiting employees, admitting students into the school as if they are entering the enterprise, and enabling graduates to step into their jobs immediately upon graduation."

    Meanwhile, from its inception, the design of the "White Swan Program" transcended the traditional "school-enterprise duality" mindset by proactively integrating "family power" as a pivotal component of the educational ecosystem, with preliminary institutional arrangements put in place. The first critical step involves informed consent and value alignment: prior to students' enrollment in the program, a dedicated information session is jointly organized by the school and the enterprise for families of prospective students. This session comprehensively outlines the program's distinctive features, training objectives, developmental pathways, career prospects, and potential challenges (such as stringent professional standards and phased high-intensity practical training), ensuring that parents fully understand and consent to participation by signing an informed consent form. This process establishes a collaborative foundation and maximizes parental support. Secondly, a clear communication framework among families, schools, and communities has been established. In this framework, the class advisor is designated as the primary person responsible for daily communication among these three parties. A dedicated parent liaison group (such as one on WeCom) is set up for the "White Swan Program" to serve as a rapid channel for information dissemination, event notifications, and simple inquiries. The class advisor is tasked with regularly updating parents on students' academic performance at school, practical training outcomes in enterprises, and periodic evaluations, ensuring the smooth flow of fundamental information. Furthermore, family roles are organically integrated into pivotal educational milestones. For instance, parents are invited to witness the signing ceremony during the program's inauguration, fostering a sense of ritual and belonging. Additionally, during the signing of internship agreements, parents' rights to be informed and to supervise are explicitly outlined. Although these initial designs may appear fundamental, they clearly convey the "White Swan Program's" anticipation of and emphasis on family participation in vocational education talent cultivation. They lay the groundwork for subsequently fully leveraging "family empowerment" and constructing a more intricate collaborative network among families, schools, and communities, marking an innovative exploration of home-school-community cooperative education in both concept and practice within the program.

Innovative Practice: Activating "Family Power" and Building an Ecosystem for Collaborative Education among Home, School, and Community

    This study addresses the pain points in current vocational education caused by the absence of family involvement, such as insufficient parental recognition of vocational education, underutilized family occupational resources, and a lack of family-based career planning. By establishing a family occupational resource empowerment mechanism, we aim to activate "family empowerment" within vocational education. Using the "ecosystem for collaborative education among families, schools, and communities" as a platform, we organically integrate the resources of these three parties to facilitate the realization of the goal of "comprehensive immersion of families, schools, and communities" in vocational education talent development.

Figure 1:

Construction of an "Ecosystem for Collaborative Education among Home, School, and Community" from the Perspective of Integration of Industry and Education

   Specifically, families bear the primary responsibility. By focusing on the transmission of workplace experience, the guidance of occupational values, and the optimization of parent-child relationships, they aim to deepen students' understanding and identification with professional roles while expanding venues for students' occupational experiences and practical opportunities. Schools play a leading role by exploring the occupational resources within families in the context of industry-education integration, effectively integrating these resources, and establishing platforms to facilitate the infiltration of occupational culture through multi-faceted collaborative evaluation. Society (including communities and enterprises) provides essential support by leveraging practical settings, industry mentor resources, and public service platforms to strengthen students' sense of responsibility and adaptability to job roles. This collaborative educational ecosystem follows a pathway of mutual embedding, linkage, and symbiosis among the three parties' resources. It emphasizes the innovative activation of "family power" in vocational education based on industry-education integration. Through a dynamic, multi-faceted collaborative evaluation and feedback mechanism, it facilitates the integrated development of students' occupational cognition, experiences, skills, and professional qualities, promoting the formation of occupational values and the enhancement of comprehensive competencies. Ultimately, it establishes a talent cultivation framework where the three parties "jointly nurture occupational ideals, jointly shape occupational spirit, and jointly build occupational responsibility."

Fostering a Collaborative Conceptual Synergy among Families, Schools, and Communities in Education

    In the early stages of domestic academic research on collaborative education involving families, schools, and communities, the focus was primarily on "home-school co-education." Scholars generally agreed that families and schools constitute the core and fundamental units of collaborative education, emphasizing the importance of integrating families into students' growth processes (Wu & Zhang, 2021). According to relevant reviews, the evolution of the concept of collaborative education among families, schools, and communities can be summarized into three stages: "separate education," "home-school cooperative co-education," and "collaborative education among families, schools, and communities." Each stage reflects the evolving educational policies of the nation and its demands regarding whom to cultivate and how to cultivate them in different eras (Fan & He, 2023). In terms of its connotation, collaborative education among families, schools, and communities primarily refers to "the shared responsibility of multiple stakeholders from families, schools, and society to promote student development through collaboration" (Gu et al., 2022). This concept underscores that schools, families, and society, as dynamically interacting subsystems, collectively form the core environment influencing individual development. Therefore, collaboration among these three entities can optimize students' socio-emotional development and academic achievements. Its core strength lies in its ability to mobilize extensive family and social resources, forming a diversified support network (Ran et al., 2024).

    Current domestic academic research in this field primarily revolves around four aspects: the connotative characteristics, essential implications, practical status quo, and mechanism construction of collaborative education among families, schools, and communities. The volume of research literature has been steadily increasing, gradually establishing itself as one of the research hotspots in the educational domain. However, the research methodologies predominantly rely on empirical speculation and summarization, with a relative scarcity of scientifically rigorous empirical studies. Moreover, there is a lack of in-depth analysis of micro-level entities  (Fan & He, 2023). Additionally, existing research tends to concentrate on the stages of basic and higher education, with relatively insufficient attention given to vocational education, particularly at the secondary vocational education level (Zhu, 2024; Xu & Yang, 2023). Nevertheless, vocational education exhibits distinct characteristics that differentiate it from basic and higher education, and this holds true in the dimension of family involvement in education as well. Firstly, most families demonstrate relatively low recognition and participation in vocational education, often assuming the role of "passive recipients" rather than "active participants," thereby underestimating their potential educational value. Secondly, existing research predominantly remains confined within the "school-enterprise" binary framework, lacking systematic exploration of the mechanisms for deeply integrating families into collaborative education. Notably, there is a dearth of effective pathway analyses on how to address parents' cognitive biases towards vocational education and stimulate their motivation to participate. This theoretical lag often results in collaborative education among families, schools, and communities being reduced to formalistic communication in practice, failing to form a cohesive educational force. Consequently, this has become a bottleneck restricting the enhancement of talent cultivation quality in vocational education.

    Based on this, Guangzhou Tourism & Business Vocational School and Guangzhou White Swan Hotel, at the outset of launching the "White Swan Program," regarded "conceptual consensus" as the logical starting point for activating the "power of families" and implemented a set of precise value-transmission strategies. Firstly, a bidirectional and transparent information dissemination mechanism was established. The school and the enterprise jointly organized multiple rounds of parent briefings in various formats. During these events, not only did the school elaborate on the program's positioning and talent cultivation plan, but senior executives from the enterprise also personally attended to present detailed data and case studies showcasing the development trends of the hotel industry, the brand strength of the White Swan Hotel, employee promotion pathways, and the compensation and benefits system. Particular emphasis was placed on highlighting the career development prospects of management trainees as future management reserve cadres for frontline service positions at the White Swan Hotel, aiming to dispel parents' stereotypes about service talents in the hotel industry being "low-end, unstable, and lacking career advancement opportunities" through specific information. Secondly, the core demands of family support were clearly defined, emphasizing that the "power of families" does not merely require parents to possess work experience in the hotel industry or professional knowledge in hotel service and management. Instead, it expects family members to play multiple roles such as "emotional supporters" (e.g., accepting their children's career choices and offering encouragement when they feel lost or uncertain), "habit supervisors" (e.g., collaborating in cultivating etiquette norms and punctuality discipline specific to the hotel industry), and "growth witnesses" (e.g., actively participating in various activities marking key milestones in their children's development). By lowering the barriers to parental involvement and stimulating their enthusiasm, the ultimate goal is to substantially enhance families' recognition of vocational education. Simultaneously, by effectively tapping into the occupational resources available within families, efforts are made to cultivate capable, motivated parents as occupational mentors. These parents are encouraged to impart their workplace experiences and occupational values to their children, transforming the domestic space into a practical venue for occupational exploration. This approach expands and deepens the school's educational practices, fostering a more holistic and immersive learning environment for students.

Establishing a Family-Centered Empowerment Mechanism for Vocational Resources

    As the foundational cornerstone of the "ecosystem for collaborative education among families, schools, and communities," the family-based empowerment mechanism for vocational resources serves as a pivotal component. It aims to systematically integrate occupational elements within the family sphere and transform them into effective resources for talent cultivation through structured design. Grounded in social learning theory and situated cognition theory, this mechanism underscores the critical role of family occupational experiences and practices in vocational education talent development. It activates the "family power" in vocational education through four dimensions: resource exploration (establishing a parental occupational resource repository), practical translation (instituting a parental occupational mentorship system), daily immersion (implementing effective family-based vocational education practices), and value recognition (strengthening parental endorsement of vocational education). By securing resource support, activity support, human resource support, and emotional support from families, it seeks to maximize the effectiveness of talent cultivation.

Figure 2:

Family Occupational Resource Empowerment Mechanism

     In terms of specific implementation, firstly, methods such as questionnaires and interviews are employed to systematically organize and analyze parents' occupational backgrounds and professional skills. These data are then classified and encoded based on three dimensions: industry type, job characteristics, and educational value, thereby forming a parent occupational resource pool that can be aligned with talent cultivation. Secondly, parents with typical professional experiences and significant occupational resources are selected to form a team of occupational mentors. A collaborative guidance mechanism is established between parent mentors and mentors from schools and enterprises to jointly develop workplace cases based on real-world work scenarios. These mentors are invited to regularly visit the school to conduct career-sharing sessions and demonstrate job skills, thereby imparting workplace experience to students. Subsequently, through the design of tools such as the "Family Task List for Occupational Cognition" and the "Parent Observation Record Form," parents are guided to consciously engage in occupational experience exchanges with their children in family life, utilize their own occupational resources to lead activities, and carry out daily cultivation of professional qualities. Finally, by organizing activities such as career experience days and interviews, parents are helped to develop a scientific understanding of vocational education, change their prejudices against it, strengthen their recognition of vocational education, optimize parent-child relationships, and secure emotional support from families.

    This mechanism expands the talent cultivation framework from the school-enterprise sphere to encompass the family domain by integrating familial occupational resources, thereby forming a more three-dimensional and diversified cultivation system. This talent cultivation model, which takes familial occupational resources as the link, not only enriches the connotations of industry-education integration but also provides a novel approach to addressing the fragmentation issues in vocational education talent development.

Optimizing the School-Led Class-Based Occupational Culture System

    As a specific implementation pathway within the "ecosystem of collaborative education involving families, schools, and communities," the optimization of the school-led class-based occupational culture system entails a systematic reconstruction of the overall occupational culture within classes. This process organically integrates industrial elements and family educational resources into the class-based occupational culture system through four dimensions: environmental construction, institutional construction, spiritual construction, and activity construction. Through this four-dimensional synergy, the "White Swan Program" has effectively achieved four major transformations: the class environment has shifted from a mere learning space to an occupational cognition space; class regulations have evolved from tools for moral education management into carriers for competency cultivation; class activities have transitioned from being oriented towards moral character development to serving as platforms for capability enhancement; and the class spirit has transformed from abstract collective slogans into a driving force for value guidance. In each phase of construction, this case study creatively incorporates the family element, making family occupational resources and emotional support critical pillars in the establishment of the class-based occupational culture system.

Figure 3:

School-led "Four-Dimension and Three-Stage" Class Vocational Culture System

    In the construction of the class environment, this case innovatively adopts a dual-source cultural integration model of "enterprise atmosphere + family warmth." It not only introduces the visual identification system and work scenario elements from school-enterprise cooperation units but also establishes a "family occupational culture corner" to display parents' work photos, occupational stories, and more. This transforms the classroom space into one that simultaneously embodies a professional atmosphere and the warmth of family. In the establishment of class regulations, the "White Swan Program" breaks through the traditional paradigm of class management by drawing on enterprise management systems (such as the regular meeting system of hotel departments) to formulate class rules. Simultaneously, it creates the role of "parent observer," inviting parents to participate in the supervision and evaluation of class management, thereby forming a dual restraint mechanism of "enterprise standards + family support."

Figure 4:

The "Parental Workplace Role Model Forum," a flagship activity of the "White Swan Program"

Establishing a Vocational Practice and Evaluation System Centered on Society

    As a specific implementation pathway within the "ecosystem of collaborative education involving families, schools, and communities," establishing a vocational practice and evaluation system centered on society involves integrating social resources to construct a closed-loop cultivation mechanism of "practice-reflection-evaluation." This transforms social practice venues into authentic classrooms for nurturing vocational literacy, encompassing both practical and evaluative systems. In terms of building the vocational practice system, a three-tier practice matrix of "enterprise bases + family networks + community platforms" is established: enterprises provide standardized training such as corporate courses and job rotations, families leverage parental occupational resources to facilitate personalized vocational observations (e.g., accompanying parents in community service work), and communities organize public-interest vocational service projects (e.g., etiquette support for large-scale events). This case innovatively designs a "Parent-Child Vocational Practice Week," where parents act as practice supervisors, guiding students through real-world work tasks from enterprises to communities, fostering an immersive experience of "learning by doing and comprehending through learning."

Figure 5:

Participation of the "White Swan Program" in Vocational Practice Activities Led by Enterprises

    In the establishment of a diversified and collaborative evaluation system, this case innovatively adopts the "Three-Dimension, Five-Stakeholder" assessment model. The three dimensions encompass skill proficiency, professional ethics, and a sense of responsibility, while the five evaluation stakeholders include corporate mentors, professional instructors, community representatives, parent mentors, and the students themselves. Notably, the evaluation by parent mentors focuses on students' familial manifestations of occupational behavior habits, with the development of soft skills such as communication, collaboration, and time management being documented through the "Home-Based Professional Competence Observation Form." To enhance the effectiveness of the evaluation, a feedback mechanism involving three parties has been established, with regular symposiums organized among enterprises, schools, and families to jointly deliberate on improvement strategies for students' vocational growth.

Practical Outcomes: The Emergence of the Value of Home-School-Community Collaborative Education

Significant Enhancement in Students' Comprehensive Professional Competence and Fruitful Achievements in Class Construction

    Following the implementation of this case, students' comprehensive professional competence has witnessed a substantial improvement. Parent observation reports indicate a notable enhancement in students' occupational behavior habits, with 80% of parents reporting that their children can transfer corporate service standards to household chores, and the excellence rate in occupational responsibility assessments has increased by 30%. Among the exemplary growth cases, Mr. Shao, who previously exhibited severe occupational cognitive biases, evolved into an outstanding model in professional course learning after participating in a series of hotel vocational experience activities, inspiring a group of peers to form skill-based mutual assistance study groups.

    Leveraging the "Home-School-Community Collaborative Education Ecosystem," the class construction has undergone a qualitative transformation, fostered a positive and upward class ethos and yielded abundant achievements. The "White Swan Program" has established a distinctive class brand. The implementation of corporate-style management systems has ensured a stable student attendance rate of over 90%. Additionally, five teaching modules developed based on parents' occupational resources have been incorporated into the school-based labor education curriculum. Meanwhile, the "White Swan Program" has achieved remarkable results in numerous high-profile school events, producing a large cohort of outstanding students with exceptional professional competence and exemplary moral character. For instance, a class culture construction plan integrating the dual cultural models of "corporate atmosphere + familial warmth" clinched the first prize in the school-level class culture construction evaluation. Other accolades include the titles of Civilized Class, first prizes in Class Style Display and Overall Team Score at the School Sports Meet, first prize in the School Football League, and second prize in the Choir Competition. Notably, 23 students, including student Shao and student He, have garnered awards in sports, ideology and politics, and arts. Furthermore, student Li's youth talent show titled "The Greater Bay Area's Young Heroes: The Enduring Charm of Cai Li Fo" secured the provincial first prize in the "Skills Cultivation for National Rejuvenation" series of educational activities organized by Guangdong Province's vocational colleges in 2024, under the outstanding performance (exhibition) category.

Successful Structural Reshaping of the Educational Community and Significant Improvement in Parent-Child Relationships

    This case has achieved a restructuring of the educational community by creating a home-school-community collaborative education ecosystem. Parents' proactivity in participating in vocational education has markedly increased, with a 100% archiving rate in the parental occupational resource database. Parents actively engage in various class activities, including class meetings, extracurricular programs, and labor education classes, providing both their presence and resource support for all key class events. The improvement in parent-child relationships has been particularly notable. Joint home-school assessments indicate that the frequency of parent-child communication has risen from 1.2 times per week to 3.0 times, while the incidence of conflicts has decreased by 58%. In a representative case, Mr. Wang, a parent with extensive experience in the hotel industry, collaborated with his son, Wan, to design a "Hotel Local Culture Service Package." This innovative concept became the core idea for the student team's participation in both the school-level workplace practice competition and the Guangzhou Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition. It not only strengthened students' professional identity but also reshaped the intergenerational interaction model, effectively enhancing the parent-child relationship.

Figure 6:

Parents actively participate in a series of vocational culture-building activities within the class

    The division of roles within the educational community has become more distinct, with corporate mentors, parent mentors, and school teachers forming a stable collaborative "iron triangle" relationship. A total of three off-campus professional competence enhancement bases, funded and led by parents, have been established. These bases have conducted 10 training and team-building activities for the vocational groups within the "White Swan Program," and the parent-led "Parental Occupational Role Model Forum" has held 12 sessions of activities. This structural transformation has systematically harnessed families' vocational education resources, with parents transitioning from passive cooperation to active co-construction. Families' recognition of and emotional support for vocational education have significantly increased compared to when the students first enrolled, thereby constructing a sustainable social support network for the school's talent cultivation efforts.

Paradigm Upgrade in Talent Cultivation Model and Emergence of the "White Swan Program" -specific Brand Effect

    The innovation in talent cultivation model driven by this case has achieved a leapfrog development from practical exploration to paradigm output. The cultivation system established by the "White Swan Program", which integrates "enterprise standards implantation + family resource transformation + community practice feedback," has significantly elevated students' comprehensive professional competence. Students have participated in the planning and implementation of over a dozen school-enterprise collaborative activities, including enterprise class opening ceremonies, hotel visits and research, the "White Swan Program" annual commendation events, and hotel service skill competition summary and commendation conferences. These activities have yielded positive outcomes and have garnered recognition from parents, society, and the industry.

    Leveraging the promotion through the "White Swan Program" video channel, the class brand effect has started to emerge, driving the expansion of the parental occupational resource network. Eight additional parental occupational mentors from the hotel and related industries have been recruited, and three parent-led professional competence cultivation stations have been established. The program's video channel has released a total of 28 program activity videos, accumulating over 60,000 total views, with the highest individual video view count reaching 9,004.

Figure 7:

The "White Swan Program" video channel consistently releases program activities and has become a platform for promoting the class brand

Experience Summary: Key Elements for Activating Family Power

Adhering to the Deep Integration of Moral Education and Professional Education

    Based on the "Home-School-Community Collaborative Education Ecosystem," this case study consistently upholds the deep integration of moral education and professional education. This approach fundamentally addresses the structural contradiction in vocational education talent cultivation, which has traditionally emphasized skills over moral character, effectively responding to the requirements outlined in the Vocational Education Law of the People's Republic of China regarding "adhering to the cultivation of both moral integrity and technical proficiency." In the process of establishing a class-based vocational culture system, a social practice system, and a diversified collaborative evaluation system, this case study emphasizes the organic integration of professional ethics and craftsmanship spirit into vocational and professional pursuits. This integration provides operational practical carriers for value shaping, constructing a "moral-technical integration" education system with vocational education characteristics. It not only meets the industry's demand for talents with "strong moral character and high technical proficiency" but also provides crucial support for the typological development of vocational education.

Upholding the Primary Role of Families in Education

    This case study firmly establishes the family as the principal entity in education, emphasizing the activation of familial occupational heritage and everyday educational settings. Through a four-dimensional synergy of resource exploration, practical application, daily immersion, and value recognition, it transforms abstract occupational perceptions into embodied growth experiences. This focus on family agency effectively bridges the gap between school-based vocational education and real-life contexts. Parents engage deeply as resource providers, participants, and evaluators, facilitating a transition in talent cultivation from a "school-led" model to a "home-school-community collaborative" approach. This ensures the school's leadership in the educational process while fully leveraging the family's unique strengths in value transmission and emotional support, thereby creating a high-quality educational ecosystem for nurturing technically skilled professionals with both professional expertise and occupational ethos (Chen & Liu, 2025).

Conclusion and Prospects

    Based on a systematic and in-depth analysis of the home-school-community collaborative education practices implemented by the "White Swan Program" at Guangzhou Tourism & Business Vocational School, the findings of this case study indicate that by utilizing the "Home-School-Community Collaborative Education Ecosystem" as a vehicle and innovatively constructing a family occupational resource empowerment mechanism, vocational colleges can effectively activate the long-overlooked "family power," thereby achieving substantive breakthroughs in the ecology and effectiveness of home-school-community collaborative education. The "White Swan Program" in this case has notably enhanced students' occupational identity, skill proficiency, and job stability, deepened families' understanding and support for vocational education, and simultaneously supplied partner enterprises with highly skilled talents who exhibit strong cultural alignment and significant development potential. Ultimately, this has fostered a mutually beneficial scenario where students thrive, families are satisfied, schools improve in quality, and enterprises reap benefits. The successful practice of home-school-community collaborative education in the "White Swan Program" not only validates the pivotal leveraging role of "family power" in vocational education talent cultivation but also provides a replicable and scalable solution to address the prevalent challenges of high student attrition rates and low enterprise satisfaction in vocational education talent development.

    The innovative value of this case study is primarily manifested in three aspects: Firstly, it presents a theoretical innovation by being the first to position "family power" as a core element in a ternary collaborative framework alongside schools and society, thereby providing empirical support for deepening systematic research on the family dimension within the theoretical framework of collaborative education in vocational education. Secondly, it demonstrates practical innovation by constructing an innovative family occupational resource empowerment mechanism based on social learning theory and situated cognition theory. This mechanism maximizes educational effectiveness through four dimensions: resource exploration (building a parental occupational resource database), practical transformation (establishing a parental occupational mentorship system), daily immersion (conducting effective family-based vocational education practices), and value recognition (strengthening parental identification with vocational education). It offers a clear operational guide for activating "family power" in vocational education, with strong potential for replication and application. Thirdly, the case exhibits remarkable typicity. Leveraging the nationally influential school-enterprise partnership between Guangzhou Tourism & Business Vocational School and White Swan Hotel, its experiences carry both authority and persuasiveness, significantly enhancing the demonstrative value and radiating potential of the research findings.

    This case study also has certain limitations: Firstly, the case selection focuses on a single well - known school - enterprise cooperation project. Its superior resource conditions and brand effect may limit the general applicability of this case model in regions with weak foundations or among small - and medium - sized enterprises. Secondly, although efforts have been made to diversify data collection, the coverage of in - depth interviews with parents and enterprises can still be further expanded, and there is a lack of long - term tracking data on students' career development trajectories. Thirdly, the quantitative evaluation system for the effectiveness of collaborative education needs to be improved, especially the precise measurement of the contribution of "family power" still requires exploration. Based on this, future research can be further deepened from the following three aspects: First, comparative studies can be conducted on cross - regional and multi - type projects (such as different majors and different enterprise sizes) to test the adaptability and optimization direction of the model. Secondly, a longitudinal tracking method can be employed to evaluate the long - term impact and effectiveness of this home - school - community collaborative education model on students' medium - and long - term career development. Finally, a multi - dimensional quantitative indicator system for the efficiency of home - school - community collaboration can be developed to enhance the scientificity and replicability of the evaluation, and the feasibility of using digital platforms (such as customized APPs and virtual home - school communities) to improve the efficiency and participation of home - school - community collaborative education can be explored.