The Pathway To Excellence

Talents play important roles in our society. The issues of cultivating talents are of great importance. In the process of cultivating talents, the higher education institutions shoulder great responsibilities. As researchers in the field of higher education, we should reflex the role that the higher education institution has played in the growth of talented students. Currently, relevant researchers have done some researches on the issues of educating top students. Although there have been some excellent researches and findings, there are still some flaws in them. One of the main flaws is that, all these researches did not pay attention to the development process of top students and neglected the interaction between these students and colleges or universities environment that circumscribed them?Based on the in-depth interviews with 17 top students of East China Normal University, this paper discusses two problems in the frame of Urie Bronfenbrenner ecological approach to human development. These two problems are: what kind of facts in colleges or universities will take effects on the development of top students? And in the process of top students' development, what kind of interactive relationship exists between the students and environments.The author found that, in the process of top students' development, the institution aims, the institution scale, the relationship with faculty, friendship and peer groups, curriculum and teaching, relevant programs and services that deigned for them will take a great effect. Meanwhile, these effects will also be mediated by the interactive relationship between individual student and these factors. Based on the validation of three assumptions on the interactive relationship between individual students and higher educational environments, this paper also argues that the development of top student is a function of interactive relations between students and environment circumscribed them.