Since the winter vacation, El Krimi Ahmed Riyad, a Moroccan freshman majoring in aerospace engineering at the International Education College (IEC), has spent his spare time building a fixed‑wing remote‑controlled model aircraft. Meanwhile, he teamed up with three Chinese students from the Aerospace Engineering College, Mechanical & Electrical Engineering College, and IEC. The team worked in the lab during spare time and vacations to prepare for discipline competitions, enabling Chinese and international students to conduct innovative practices together.
Following open-source tutorials, Riyad finished building the model step by step, including foam cutting, fuselage shaping, battery wiring, steering-gear tuning and flight-control calibrating. He also made a simple cockpit control station and installed an FPV camera for first-person view flight. Basic safety functions including altitude limits and geofence protection were integrated into the model. What’s more, multiple adjustments to the aircraft’s center of gravity and steering parameters were made to resolve common technical issues during assembly. After consistent improvement from winter vacation to the spring semester, the self-made model aircraft completed its outdoor test flight smoothly.
As a new engineering freshman, he applied basic classroom knowledge and his strong interest in aeromodelling to completing the whole project independently, from part fabrication and circuit wiring to field test flights. Talking about this experience, he said that repeated debugging and adjustments brought far more than expected difficulties yet great satisfaction. The continuous practice and troubleshooting helped him gain solid hands-on experience.
Such persistent independent exploration demonstrates international students’ proactive spirit of scientific innovation. Such practical achievements also enrich on-campus Sino-foreign cooperative practices and provide a positive reference for joint innovation among Chinese and international students. In the future, IEC will continue to open various tech resources to international students, providing equipment and technical support. The college will encourage more international students to join innovation activities and build a platform for Sino-foreign academic and practical exchanges.
