The Governance of China, a book written in 2014 by Xi Jinping returned to the public’s sight. The reason? His opinion about education back then echoes China’s new rules barring for-profit tutoring in core school subjects to reduce burden for children and to ease financial pressures for families.
Today we will show you a few exact paragraphs he wrote, which should give a better understanding of China’s moves today:
“We must adhere to the socialist orientation of education modernization in our country, adhere to the principle of public welfare in education, regard education equity as the national basic policy, and vigorously promote the innovation of the education system. It is necessary to speed up nurturing learning habits for everyone, allowing that anyone can learn anywhere at any time. It is also necessary to accelerate the establishment of an equal education system, enabling everyone to learn regardless of gender, region, wealth, and ethnicity.”
“The most prominent problem in education is that primary and secondary school students are exhausted and stressed. Some of the approaches that schools take are short-sighted and utilitarian, posing toxic levels of stress to students. What’s more serious is that everyone knows that this situation is wrong, but they are walking along this road getting more and more trapped.
“Some off-campus training institutions violate the educational rules, speed up students’ learning progress too fast, and carry out “exam-oriented” training, which not only increases the extracurricular burden of students and the financial burden of families, but also disrupts the regular school curriculum. The social response is strong. An industry of conscience cannot become a profit-seeking industry. We should have rules to manage the off-campus training institutions, so that off-campus education can return to the normal track.”
“It is necessary to enhance the education abroad which can serve as a diplomatic approach. We should focus on educational exchanges and cooperation by continuing to run global Confucius Institutes and Confucius Classrooms, so that global Chinese learners and foreign students in China will become good friends of China. It is also necessary to vigorously cultivate international talents with global perspectives who deeply understand Chinese policies and international rules, speak fluent foreign languages and master in global negotiations. We will specifically train professional skilled talents and management talents speaking foreign languages for “One Belt One Road” and other global initiatives, we will also train and select outstanding talents to work in international organizations. The primary mission is to speed up the construction of overseas Chinese schools, providing Chinese language education for Chinese children abroad whose parents are working in foreign companies. At the same time, Chinese schools also provide convenience for second-generation immigrants of Chinese descent in foreign countries to learn Chinese, understand Chinese history and appreciate Chinese culture.”