Nine-Year Compulsory Education Policy in China. Essay

Nine-Year Compulsory Education Policy in China
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Nine-Year Compulsory Education Policy in China
1 Executive summary
The People’s Republic of China is among the most populated countries in the world, with a population of over 1.4 billion on an area of 9.7 million square kilometers. From the time the opening policies and economic forums were implemented in 1978, China has been among the fastest-growing leading world economies. A GDP growth rate that averages 7% on an annual basis has made China become the second most successful economy globally in terms of its aggregate nominal GDP. However, even with China being among the most influential economies in the world, there is little that is known in other countries about the country’s education system of how its students learn as well as the policies involved CITATION Guo191 \l 1033 (Guo, Huang, & Zhang, 2019). The paper aims at providing a detailed look at education in China, with a detailed look at China’s nine-year compulsory education policy. The paper revolves around the notion that through being an avenue for free access to education in the country, China's mandatory nine-year education policy has gone a long way in instilling the need for education to be promoted. The policy has aided in facilitating learning, transmitting knowledge, and inspiring innovation, all-important for societal and individual development.
2 Context and Importance of the Problem
In the course of China’s development, the problem of education access has often been widely studied from various differing perspectives by educationists, economists, sociologists, and psychologists. Among the many areas of interest for the Chinese government are three areas that have proved to be standing out as the most concerning and worth looking at. These include education quality, education return, and education equity CITATION Guo191 \l 1033 (Guo, Huang, & Zhang, 2019). The problem has proved to be central to the process and result of education development. It has have also been interconnected with the question the country has wanted to answer, that is, how good education can be achieved in a way that promotes China’s social and economic development.
It has widely been accepted that the goal and objective of education lie in promoting learning as well as helping individuals in mastering knowledge and developing skills, and this consequently aids them in finding better jobs, having a higher living quality, and earning income. More so, the endeavor has been believed to lead to growth in the economy and improvement of the social environment CITATION Oye17 \l 1033 (Oyeniran & Uwamahoro, 2017). The social and economic returns of education for societies and individuals are regarded as critical and are widely looked at when estimating the chances of education being able to achieve its goal.
From 1966 to 1976, the Cultural Revolution has severely been damaging China's education and leading it towards becoming an even more profound crisis. However, between 1977 and 1991, a new policy of reform led to the opening globally and became the most extensive priority for reconstructing education. A great leader in Chines history, Deng Xiaoping, engaged China towards learning from the West. Therefore, 1978 was particularly important in China's modern history, due to its marking its entry into a time of aiming to make reforms as one of its socialist modernization goals.
The country aggregately walked on a new approach to development and reform. Since 1978, China's education policy has been experiencing four main stages. These include reconstructing and recovery of an educational approach from 1978 to 1984; the aggregate start-up of reforms in the country's education system from 1985 to 1993; the adjustment of policies that face the improvement of a network of the market economy from 1993 to 2002 and the new development of education policies according to the guidance of the scientific presentation on development CITATION Guo191 \l 1033 (Guo, Huang, & Zhang, 2019). All the stages thrived intending to have to improve the education system. The fast economic development of realizing the nine-year compulsory education will go a long way towards proving an adequate foundation for more reform of China's culture.
China is now increasingly realizing that achieving the education goal requires a critical consideration of education quality and access, which need to be guaranteed. Such has led to the implementation of the nine-year compulsory education policy in China. However, it has often not been very satisfactory, and there is indeed room for improvement. Much research needs to be focused on the issue. In better enabling, better responses to the changes in the current word, as well as what is expected of the country, the Chinese education system started a rather unprecedented reform CITATION Ngo07 \l 1033 (Ngok, 2007).
The reform covered all the aspects, from education promotion in preschool, including educational goals, the roles that researchers, international corporations, and teachers have. Therefore, the country’s education system has steadily improved from higher as well as primary and secondary education. It is becoming rather apparent that until now, a couple of reforms have undoubtedly aided in modernizing the Chinese education system CITATION Ngo07 \l 1033 (Ngok, 2007). The paper aims at analyzing changes and examining how reforms had been carried through, the related challenges as well as the effects on China’s education quality in the most populous nation in the world.
3 Critique of Policy Options
1 Significance of the Policy Option as a Reform and Modernization Tool Education
In ensuring the real importance of education, there has been an adoption of a couple of rules, laws, as well as administrative regulations in China that lead to the basic educational system framework of the country. The objective of the nine-year compulsory education policy in China was to initially make a system of education that gears the political system, the system of a socialist economy, and the –technological system CITATION Yun20 \l 1033 (Xiaoy, Liz, & Zhao, 2020). Only in such a manner could it be possible to achieve a vivid and active societal development of the economy, and in carrying out a new approach to educational development.
Additionally, the 1982 article of the Constitution dictates that the country should develop a socialist form of education in raising the scientific and cultural level of its people. There are other laws as well that aim at rejuvenating the nation through education and science complete it as well as reminding that knowledge belongs to modernization as well as aiming at building a socialist society that is advanced ideologically, culturally as well as materially. By the authors, principles-based education comes with Marxism-Leninism Mao Zedong thought as well as the theory that comes with building socialism with the Chinese traits. Consequently, the political and ideologically training the youth is evident at every stage of education background as well as being framed by regulations and laws from the reforms CITATION Yun20 \l 1033 (Xiaoy, Liz, & Zhao, 2020).
The education system is referred to as the primary form of education in a state, and reform of the education system acts as the main element of China’s education reform. In aiming at modernization, any education system has to be adopted by the political, economic, cultural development. An economic boom that came in the 1980s enabled Chin to adapt as well as develop its system of education according to the reforms which reflect the social values of China, and economic and political realities. From the time China came with great significance to the education quality, efforts were being made towards protecting and maintaining the educational right of disadvantaged and minority groups CITATION Guo191 \l 1033 (Guo, Huang, & Zhang, 2019). Developments of education in the western parts of the country and aiding poor children have been two well-known examples.
The time there is a noted change in the economic system of a country, its education system also changes, and reforms of the educational system go a long way towards benefiting the improvement of economic systems. On May 27, 1985, the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CPP) passed a couple had issued laws on the Reform of Educational System, and CPP also issued the Program of China's Education Reform and Development in 1993. The goals of these reforms were to enhance the country’s competence and providing better and more workforce in adapting to reforms in the socialist market aimed to improve the political and economic system, and in the technological and scientific development CITATION Oye17 \l 1033 (Oyeniran & Uwamahoro, 2017). From 1978, in the course of the period of opening up and reform, China carried through a nine-year compulsory education system, a system for academic degree acquisition, system for graduates, and more improvement of the adult system of education.
The main goal of China’s system of education was primarily and focused on learning training, with a structured curriculum that is meant to counter the many needs that students had selected skills needed in the lifelong learning. Nevertheless, it proved to be more advantageous for the young generation in receiving training meant for the globalization and the challenging economy of the world, as a way of giving young people a better chance of employment. In such a perspective, the national exams of China, referred to as gaokao, can be reformed towards hatching and encouraging more talent CITATION Yun20 \l 1033 (Xiaoy, Liz, & Zhao, 2020). There had been reports on some provinces in the country have educators that wished to see better changes in China’s gaokao system, one with the more diverse channels of university entrance hatching.
The primary role played by gaokao included being the central canal in getting the Chinese society ahead from the 10th century. It currently prepares students for joining the best universities in China. By Hilton, a majority of the Chinese individuals, particularly the educators and scholars, criticize the gaokao system, which argues that education changes may never be successful with regards to criteria apart from the learning that is focused on gaokao gets used in the university admission. However, there was a question on how quality can be preserved in the most extensive education system in the world at the time the Chinese government needs to ensure prudence for the gaokao reform. The only chance many students have of climbing the social ladder is by going to the best educational institutions CITATION Yun20 \l 1033 (Xiaoy, Liz, & Zhao, 2020). Indeed, there are still challenges that remain regardless of efforts the Chinese government has been putting in place. In Asian societies, the exams for entering the university were still considered by a majority of students and their parents as the path towards a somewhat successful life.
2 Compulsory Education and Its Implementation
China led the promulgation of the Compulsory Education Law in 1986, placing forward the nine-year mandatory education system to be carried through. Compulsory education is ensured countrywide according to the Compulsory Education Law. The law stipulated that all adolescents and children need to get free training, universal, and mandatory. The nine-year compulsory education system in China includes junior and primary-secondary education. Adolescents and children of the school-age are excluded from entrance examinations. Children that are six years old above have to go through compulsory education of nine years. There is responsibility carried out by the local governments, under the central authorities’ control CITATION Oye17 \l 1033 (Oyeniran & Uwamahoro, 2017). Preceding the implementation of the compulsory education system in 1986 as well as introducing a monitoring system in the development of literacy and compulsory in 1993 education, a lot of progress was made from the quantitative development in mandatory education before the final years of the previous century.
Table 1: Enrollment Ratio of School-age Children in Primary Schools
In 1995, there was a lot of effort being put on the increase of enrolment rates in the higher as well as secondary education. The reform came with various objectives. These included generalizing compulsory education in 9 years (today, only 75% of an age group in 9 years in school); removing illiteracy; developing technical knowledge at the secondary level, continuing education, and adult education; improvement of the education level for girls, and for minorities in the country's weak areas; renovating and contrasting buildings for teaching and research as a way of increasing the carrying capacity of students CITATION Oye17 \l 1033 (Oyeniran & Uwamahoro, 2017). In 2007, the population coverage of literacy education and compulsory education arrived at 99%.
In 2011, China’s Ministry of Education reported the enrolment rate among primary-age children in the country had 99.77%, and the aggregate rates of enrolment for the junior high had been 100.2%, ...