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70 years after being founded, the People’s Republic of China has attracted worldwide attention for its achievements in education. During this period, various high-level policies have been issued to maintain education as a public good and protect its public nature against the invasion of marketization. As it continues to steer away from being overly exam-oriented, China’s education still faces important challenges such as easing the academic burden among primary and middle school students, reforming the one-size-fits-all type of evaluation for high school admission, and addressing bullying among students. Urgent issues also include the implementation of latest policies on early childhood education and the administration of both for-profit and not-for-profit private education. Innovative solutions need to be developed for these issues while China’s education governance undergoes modernization. The third decade of the 21st century will see China enter an era of “post universal-access”, for which a sense of urgency for reform and forward thinking is called for.
Governments, education authorities and schools at all levels have made joined efforts indiversifying high-school education. While significant results have been achieved there is still a long way to go before pathways could diversify and schools could specialize. Such diversification should, on the system level, foster integrity and promote well-rounded human development, serve their diverse needs and integrate the use of science and technology. Following the implementation of “3+3” model for college entrance examination in six provinces and municipalities including Zhejiang and Shanghai, eight more including Guangdong announced that they would adopt the “3 + 1 + 2” model. If such reform is to At the core of this reform shall not be the selection and combination of tested subjects but how the admission process is handled.
Comprehensively improving the basic conditions for compulsory education inpoor areas is an integral part of the implementation and enhancement of compulsory education policy. After five years of hard work, although there are still a few remaining problems and weak points, most primary and middle schools are no longer faced with poor infrastructure and are ready to move onto the next stage of development focusing on improving the quality of education. Affected by shifting dynamics in the school-age population and staffing austerity policy, imbalance between supply and demand of teachers is prominent. Reform is seen in various aspects, such as circulating resources within the system, implementing fixed-term employment and hiring teachers from outside the system. However, limitations still exist. A proper allocation system of authorized teachers, strategies to broaden channels for teacher recruitment, and mechanisms for exit, await implementation.
Private education has existed in different forms and changed along with social structure in China. In the “post-4%” era, the demand for private education has become increasingly mainstream. At present, the major issue of education development is not the conflict between public education and private education, but whether they together could meet societal demand. As the growth of fiscal revenue slows down, the development of private education will largely hinge on the degree to which public finance could invest in transforming the existing public basic education system and the efficiency and effectiveness at which this transformation takes place. A study of policy documents issued to implement central government’s new amendments to policies regarding private education, we observe innovations in the areas of multi-stakeholder governance, tax benefits, protection of land use, teacher and student rights, financial asset management, introduction of high-quality educational resources, improving governments’ methods of management, and exit mechanisms. Existing areas for improvement include insufficiently detailed policy description, low feasibility of proposed actions and lack of supporting policies.
Considering problems such aslack of alignment among different stakeholders’ goals and interests, lack of clarity in what they can and should do, and lack of clear procedures for the collaborative governance process, we should explore the paths to realize multi-stakeholder cooperative governance of the public service system of inclusive preschool education, and promote concord in interests and targets between the government, market, social organizations and individual citizens.
“20policies for vocational education”, “expanded enrollment” and “expanded training” of higher vocational education are three major policy hotspots in 2019. Vocational education has entered a new era. In view of the outstanding problems presented by the current “expanding enrollment” of higher vocational education, it is recommended that vocational schools manage concurrent changes in three fronts, namely, quantity, order and quality; offer differentiated education to different student groups so as to ensure improvement in quality whilst enrollment expands.
Improving the capacitive of regional governance in education is key to its reform.Taking the comprehensive reform of Karamay in Xinjiang as an example, we use the theoretical framework of regional education ecology to systematically analyze the regional education governance system and governance capacity and summarize the key elements in improving the mechanisms for regional education governance. Jinzhong City in Shanxi Province has promoted the Principal’s Professional Ranking System and the co-development of ordinary and vocational high schools. It has also introduced a series of major reforms in education evaluation, teacher management, and evaluation of teachers’ professional titles in schools. Together, these measures have removed institutional obstacles and stimulated the vitality of its education development.
Students in the county-level high schools are situated at the intersection between the socioeconomic and urban-rural spectra. Self-identity, academic choices, after-school life, family environment, and future expectations are aspects looked at to describe a rough picture of what it is like to be a child in county-level high schools, and obstacles for students’ future development are discussed. At present, there is a huge deviation between the cognitive evaluation of rural schools and the functions that rural schools actually undertake. Facing the new reality, we hope to recognize the independent agency of schools and to adjust ways in which schools are evaluated and supported, so that a better ecosystem for education could be constructed to support the growth of rural schools.
Since 2009, Mainland China has participated in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) four times over the span of a decade. Analysis of the content and results of PISA shows that more attention should be paid to creating a proper metacognition of PISA and understanding the diverse backgrounds and practices in participating countries rather than their rankings. As artificial intelligence is widely used in education for promoting personalized learning and learning efficiency, vast possibilities exist. Various policies have been issued to promote the role of AI in education and accelerate its integration. However, many problems have also emerged. We call for a human-centered orientation in science and technology in order to truly promote education reform and help students develop.
In 2019, the overallevaluation of public opinion on education is steady on the rise and tends to be positive. Educational reform has deepened and produced remarkable results while various fields of education are characterized by continuous hotspots, public opinions on emergencies and regionally heated discussions. It is suggested to strengthen the research and judgment of public opinion on education and improve upon management of emergencies. In 2019, 24 provinces and cities in China have formulated plans to ease students’ academic burden. While they attracted much public attention, their implementation is not without difficulty. It is therefore necessary to establish a scientific view of “reducing student burden”, improve the corresponding policy infrastructure, and make solid progress in reforming educational evaluation, examination and admission system. The basic education system awaits future development that emphasizes equity, diversity and choice.
Integrated development of the Yangtze River Delta becomes national strategy. Based on its practices to promote the integrated development of regional education landscape, further strategies needs to be developed on the top level to investigate the needs of different regions, find the right intersection and systemize their interaction. With the modernization of education governance, the autonomous development of schools is drawing more and more attention. Basing on the autonomous development project of Weifang Hi-tech zone as an example, the approach to fostering effective multi-stakeholder governance through expanding administrative autonomy and providing empowerment support is discussed.
Over the past ten years, perseverance in upholding values and principles, enriching form and content of practices, adjustments and expansions in project models are seen in the overall development of non-profit sector in education. With a better grasp on the realities and  characteristics of educational non-profits, the sector is aimed at “change towards the future” and strives to serve as an integral part in innovatively transforming education in China.