They can serve as vivid teaching materials for the promotion of revolutionary traditions and culture, and socialist cultural-ethical progress, while inspiring a strong sense of patriotism and invigorating the Chinese ethos.

Today, professors routinely treat the progressive interpretation of history and progressive public policy as the proper subject of study while portraying conservative or classical liberal ideas—such as free markets, self-reliance and a distrust of central planning—as falling outside the boundaries of routine, and sometimes legitimate, intellectual investigation.

请问各位老师，文中两个while都是used to contrast two things （对比两件事物）…而，…然而的意思吗？第二个句子的while可以理解为at the same time as sth else is happening 与…同时这个意思吗？