CRS 334: Education in China

Jinjing Li Professor Greenky CRS 334 4.21.19 Education in China Education is universally regarded as the key to opportunities and success. The usage of this phrase has extensively encouraged people to pursue education as a tool for personal growth and economic liberation. As a result, people tend to look for the best education systems or highly acclaimed schools that can support their intellectual growth and facilitate the development of their critical and analytical skills. In most cases, western nations like the United States, Canada, Australia, and Canada have always been viewed as the best learning environment for students. These western nations are highly regarded in the international arena for being developed, reputable, and civilized. As a result, most students from developing countries admire studying in these countries and getting the opportunity to interact with the best learning environments. China has consistently sent its students to these countries to pursue higher education. Today, China contributes the highest percentage of international students studying abroad. One the common factors attributes to this high percentage is the inability of China to capitalize on the increasing demand for art-related courses. In this regard, it is crucial to discuss Chinese education to understand factors that motivate students from China to study overseas. The lack of belief on the education systems put in place in China leads to increase on the number of students pursuing education opportunities abroad. Even though China has a huge population that is not likely to fit in the available higher education opportunities in the country, the constant increase in the number of international students from China suggests that various push and factors are encouraging this trend (Postiglione 73). The annual intake of Chinese universities is approximated to be at 7.5 million. On the other side, research shows that out of the five million international students who are getting education out of their own countries, one out of four come from China (Xueni, 2011). Even though the country has great market opportunities which remain untapped, the above information illustrates that most of the Chinese international students value education opportunities offered abroad as compared to the one offered locally. China is emerging as a global economy and there is the development of a rigorous education system. In this rigorous Chinese education curriculum, students are valued based on their grades and academic performances. As a result, the only way of securing a position in a prestigious university is by posting good grades and exhibiting exemplary academic performances. Similarly, for students to be admitted into prestigious universities, they must sit for the versatile national university admission examination and achieve top scores (Postiglione 12). Due to the high population of students compared to the relatively low university positions available, most of the students miss out and do not get university admission. It has extensively been demonstrated that the value of education does not come from cramming ideas and memorizing concepts but by conceptualization and contextualization of the academic content to make it’s more useful or applicable in life. In this view, an effective education system is one that encourages the development of analytical skills, entrepreneurship, and creativity, but not one that stifles these attributes (Jiang, and Ma 6). However, the rigorous nature of the Chinese education system has been faulted for not encouraging the development of analytical skills, entrepreneurship, creativity, and critical thinking among students. Instead, it promotes rote memorization that stifles the development of these critical attributes of academic and professional success. Since the Chinese education system has not emphasized on art courses, studying abroad is, therefore, an option that many Chinese students tend to value profoundly since it unlocks an opportunity for them to develop critical qualities that might never be achieved through the local education system. The opportunity to pursue education abroad offers students the freedom to study courses that might be unavailable or limited in China (Mok, and Alfred 84). It also allows them to seek flexibility in pursuing something that facilitates their overall development instead of focusing primarily on test scores. Chinese parents also play a critical role in encouraging their children to pursue higher education abroad (Mok, and Alfred 86). Most of the parents have their own preferences on the courses they want their students to study while at the university. When they look for the courses in the local universities and fail to get them, they are willing to take their students abroad so that they can study the courses. This will of course depend on the resources available in the family. Some other families rely on scholarship to take their children abroad for further studies. Also, the quality of western education is considered to be better than that of most developing countries like China. There are a number of reasons for this. First, as compared to the Chinese education system which emphasizes academic scores, the education system in most developed countries focuses on the overall development of students in different domains of life including academic, personality, mental, and physical attributes. Also superiority of language is another factor. Most of the Chinese students are likely to consider pursuing English-taught western education as the best option because it is perceived to be superior to the local one. Although China has, over the years, made significant efforts to reform its education system, it still lags in several areas. Indeed, various research facilities and academic field either remain undeveloped or underdeveloped (Postiglione 7). For instance, China’s capita...