Education And Development In China's Urban And Rural Areas

What is the number of students in the primary schools in the commune or district?
What is the proportion of the total number of these students to the total population?
Approximately how many students are grouped under a single director or teacher?
At which age are children admitted to the primary schools?
Are children of both sexes admitted to the same school and until what age?
How are students assessed and for what purpose?
How are students streamed?
Is there peer education?
How much time is devoted to literacy and math instruction?
At what age do children leave primary school?

Ethnicity

Education and development are interrelated with each other. Receiving elementary education leads the individuals towards their development. The concept of internalization is related with advancement of the preconceived skills and knowledge. This assignment focuses on the education systems followed in the urban and rural areas of China. Progressing towards the main subject matter, the assignment attempts to excavate out the inequalities, which persist in the urban and rural areas of China. The consideration of Programme for International Students (PISA) makes china the focus area of the assignment. In spite of such an initiative, variation in the educational needs of the students, remains a greatest challenge for the educational institutions of China. The recommendation of policy transfer from the developing countries addresses this issue, which seems necessary in terms of the career establishment of the students (Hayhoe, 2017). Discussion of the dynamic mechanism of Chinese education would act as an agent for this assignment in terms of enhancing the quality and standard of education as a whole. Along with this, transnational education attains an important position in this mechanism. In this discussion, China’s demographic details, educational reforms would be emphasized. The intensity of these details contradicts the limitation of the rural and urban areas of China.

Officially known as Peoples Republic of China, China is the world most densely population country. This is because 1.404 billion people have preferred to settle there. This data makes the census of 2010 seem insignificant as the statistics readings for the total population was 1, 370, 536, 875. Within this, 16.60% belong to the age group of 14 years or younger. 70.14% of the people are between 15-59 years. 13.26% are the people belonging to the age range of 60 years and above (Oecd.org, 2018). According to the data of 2013, the growth rate for population was estimated to be 0.46%.

Among the total population, 91.51% are Han and 55% belong to the minority group. In terms of religion, 98% of the Chinese folk follow Buddhism, Taoism. This is according to the statistics established by the Chinese government in the census of 2018. Han is accounted as world’s largest ethnic group. Delving deep into the aspect, Han overpowers the ethnic group of provinces, excepting Tibet and Xinjiang. According to the census of 2010, the minority group has been accounted as occupying 8.49% of the total population (Oecd.org, 2018).

The people speak standard Chinese language other than Mongolian, Uyghur, Zang, Zhuang and others. 70% of the population speaks Mandarin and Yue mixed. Standard Mandarin is considered as the official language of china. Ancient manuscripts consist of the evidence regarding the writing of Sinitic language. This evidence reflects writing as the form of communication. 1956 was the era when government introduced characters, which were advanced than those of Mainland china (Oecd.org, 2018).

Urbanization

In the recent decades, the population of the urban areas in china has increased from 20% in 1980 to more than 50% in 2014. According to the data of 2012, more than 262 million workers came to china in search of employment. As a matter of specification, china takes pride in possessing over one million population in 160 cities. These even include seven megacities- chongquing, Shanghai, Beijing, Ghangzhou, Tianjin, Shenzhen and Wuhan (English.gov.cn, 2018).

Ministry of Education is entrusted with the responsibility to look after the provision of quality and standardized education to the students. According to the government, the citizens are compelled to attend school for at least nine years. Government funds have made the program, Nine years compulsory education, a grand success.

Education for a Chinese child begins at the age of 6 or 7. In the age of 12-15, the children are enrolled into three years of junior secondary education. Here, there is an exception. Some of the Chinese provinces may extend the primary education to five years and junior middle school to four years. Secondary education is completed once the child attends three years of senior middle school after the junior middle school.

The Ministry of Education reported 99% percent attendance rate in the primary schools and 80% in both the primary and middle schools. The major drive behind this is the abolition of tax funded higher education by the government in 1985 (Oecd.org, 2018). This abolition resulted in the competition between the students to expose their academic skills and capabilities. Allowance regarding the set up of private schools between 1995-2015 escalated the number of undergraduates and those holding doctoral degrees.

In 2003, china government approved 1552 institutions of learning. This is the evidence regarding the governmental initiatives regarding the provision of quality education to the students. Approval of 725,000 professors and 11 million students was a gradual progression towards enriching the knowledge, skills and capabilities of the population. The presence of 100 universities was assistance in terms of providing higher education to the school students. Such an educative environment possessed flexibility for progressing towards the professionalism. Typical evidence of this fact lies in the growth of China’s spending capacity by 20% in the era of 1999 (Mohrman, 2015). According to the current statistics, china’s spending power has reached over $100 billion. In 2006, 1.5 million students from science and engineering background completed their graduation. 2008 was the era when Chinese government published 184,080 papers written by these students.  

China’s education system in the rural and the urban regions

During the cultural revolution (1966-1976), government of china was at extreme loss difficulty as the college students, academicians and professors resigned. This was due to the malfunctioning, which shunned the systems. Lack of adequate knowledge in terms of operations management added to the complexities. In this process, the educational needs of the students were compromised, stalling the economic and technological development (Zhao & Deng, 2015). This necessitated the need for a policy.

Chinese educational policy emerged in after the Mao period. At this stage, the government planned policies related to the adoption of latest and modern technologies for providing modernized education to the students. An example here is the replacement of entrance examination with the policy of mandatory enrolment to the students based on their residence. 

The education system of China is supposed to be more advanced and the largest in the world. The diverse system of the primary and the secondary education system of the nation is comprised of over 260 million students (Chen  & Feng,  2013). According to the 2014 reports of the National Bureau of Statistics of China, the education that is being delivered through the schools are run by the states and are highly decentralized in nature. In the recent years of the progress made by the education system of the nation, the Ministry of Education has taken steps in order to shift direct control to the macro-level monitoring of the system (Nytimes.com. 2018). The growth of the population is supported with the view of the education system undertaken by the nature. However, there are discrepancies and certain biasness in the system that overlooks the rural areas of the nation. Apart from the biasness, the education system of the nation is highly integrated (Yang,   Huang  & Liu,  2014).

The education system of the nation makes it mandatory for the students to attend a pre-school, which is regarded as a compulsory education scheme. The primary education is a compulsory element that all the children must involve in. the policy of mandatory enrolment that is being undertaken by the government is therefore undertaken in order to emphasize on the compulsory approach of the primary education system (Tarrow, 2014). The enrolment of the students in the primary schools was reported to be 103% in 2006, whereas the enrolment ratio for the secondary education was reported to be 94% (Li,  Liu  & Zhang,  2012). The various aspects of the education system and the mandatory clause that was enforced by the government has helped promoting proper education across the nation. The National Bureau of Statistics of China has reported that the growing need of the education has helped the nation in making its progress in the fields of making schools for providing the necessary education to the citizens of the nation.

The urban societies of China are privileged with the advanced technologies that has helped in the undertaking the best possible measures for continuing the educational progress. The financial development has helped in the undertaking of the proper educational schemes based on the policies that are being formed by the government. On the other hand, the poverty and the other migration issues faced by the rural regions of the nation have affected the education system of the regions. The growth of the schools in the nation and the other facilities that are being provided to the urban residents cannot be provided to the rural residents. It has affected the education of the students residing in the rural areas of the nation. According to a report published in The New York Times (2014), the stellar performance of the Chinese students is portrayed in the international tests. However, there are paradigms to the element where the rural students are deprived of the facilities that are being given to the urban students through the advanced technologies and the best educational schemes prepared by the government. The gap that is being created by the policies of the government has resulted to the inequalities in the urban and the rural dwellers. Some 60 million children, according to the report, are left behind (Turner & Acker,  2017). This has given rise to the unequal states of education in various regions of the nation. The most important consideration that is being undertaken by the governments is based on the development of the urban dwellers with the provision of the technologies and the development of the schools. On the other hand, the standardization of the laws and the legislations of the mandatory education do not fit in the scenario of the rural areas.

The issues that are faced by the rural regions of China resulting to the gap in the education are based on certain factors. The factors are aimed at the lucid understanding of the discrepancies that are faced by the people living in the rural regions of the nation. It also helps in understanding the areas of the lag based on the circumstances and the other policies that are being undertaken by the government for ensuring the providence of the proper education.  The issues also help in the understanding of the paradox of the educational system prevalent in the nation and the paradigm that is being created by the nation to the world for delivering the proper education. The issues challenge he policies that are being planned by the government for ensuring that the proper education is mandatory until nine years.

The unemployment of the people in the rural areas forces them to migrate to the urban regions of the nation in search of jobs. They leave their kids to their grandparents. Migrating from the rural areas to the urban areas affect the livelihood of the children and thereby affects their education system too (Postiglione,  2015). The migration of the parents to the far cities in search of jobs leaves the kids in isolation to their rural schools where little facilities could be found for proper education. The lessons that the students learn in their dilapidated schools in the rural regions are by no means a match to the education that are received by the urban dwellers. According to a report, the facilities in the rural area schools include a blackboard and a council of teachers to guide the students with their lessons (Yang  & Welch,  2012). However, the development of the students is constrained due to the high tuitions fees that are charged from them.

The rise in the population in the rural areas has resulted to lower opportunities for the children to attend the schools. There is a rising competition in the schools of the rural regions based on the requirements of the education. On the other hand, the policy of the government based on the mandatory education has toughened the competition in the schools in the rural regions of the nation.

The quality of the education is again another important factor that differs greatly in between the rural and the urban regions of the nation. The quality differs based on the skills of the teachers and the equipments that are required for providing the value added education facilities to the students. According to a report, the institutions in the nation discriminate between some 65% of the population for providing the proper educational services. The main reason for the discrimination is based on the overgrowing population of the nation (Yeung, 2013). The institutes undertake various tests and assessments for assessing the various credibility factors before enrollment of the students. The admission tests that are being designed by the institutes are hard enough for the students coming from the rural backgrounds.  Therefore, the education system of the nation experiences a gap in the system. Based on the requirements of the students for fulfilling the policies framed by the government, the schools and the institutions in the urban have taken steps for improving the education that is being provided to a global scale. On the other hand, the rural schools and institutes have taken steps in order to adhere to the policy of mandatory education framed by the government with a little consideration of the quality of education that is being provided to the students (Zhao, 2014). This approach of the government towards the development of the education system has greatly affected the development of the rural areas, which remained uneducated mostly. It is also because of the high tuition fees that the people are unable to afford and the education is being compromised in the regions.

Variability in the educational needs stresses on the introduction of effective policies. This covers both the rural and the urban areas, where the quality of education is also of varying nature. This variation nullifies the concept of one to one policy in the nations and proposes the recommendation of policy borrowing or policy transfer. In order to upgrade the standards and quality of education, the administrative personnel of China need to borrow educational policies from the developing nations like United Kingdom. For example, china government can transfer mediclaims from the developing countries like UK. This would include the wellbeing of the children within the educational curriculum.

Higher tuition fees would compel the personnel of the educational institutions to encounter instances of abseentism, reducing the academic growth rate largely. This would create disparity in the financial parameter of Australia. Indulging in alliance with the members of the trade union would help the administrative personnel to set reasonable price for the courses. Here, the focus needs to be placed on the rural areas. This is because the rural people tend to migrate and take the children along with them. This migration puts an ombre shade to the career of the children as well as the parents. Therefore, accommodation facilities along with education would help the Chinese government to increase the trafficking of audience, especially from the foreign countries.

Variability of education in the rural and the urban areas indicate the inequal treatment, which is displayed to the foreign students. The foreign students are not familiar with the culture, tradition and customs of china. Taking due advantage of this, they are deceived, which deviates them from their goals of establishing a sound career. This creates a negative image about the Chinese culture in the minds of the foreign students, coming to enhance their preconceive skills, knowledge and capabilities. Herein lays the effectiveness and appropriateness of PISA, which would enable the Chinese administrative personnel to become aware of the approaches of the foreign students to the education, which they are receiving. Typical components of this assessment are the audits and evaluation of the proposed curriculum.

The families of the rural areas are already suffering from poverty. In these circumstances, educational needs of the children attain second preference. Therefore, the schools and institutions need to introduce peace-building education, which would prepare the children for facing the conflicts. This preparation would make the children physically and mentally in terms of ensuring the security and safety of their motherland. For this, carrying out campaigns would produce positive results. This is because campaigns would make the people aware of the importance of education in terms of promoting peace and democracy.

Indulging in meetings with the shareholders would enhance the perspectives of the administrative personnel regarding making beneficial investments in the field of education. As an example, holding seminars and lectures by renouned personalities would promote the brand of Chinese education to the foreign investors. Along with this, if social media is considered for levying the information of the newly launched scholarship programs, the schools and institutions would be able to attract large number of audience towards the brand.

Conclusion

This assignment emerges successful in providing an insight into the Chinese education. As a matter of specification, the assignment attempts to find out the challenges and inequalities within the education system of china, which has entrapped the future of the children. The issues of migration in search of employment; political unrest, economic instabilities and varying needs of the students contradict the true essence of the term education. The intensity of these issues nullifies the limitations of the Chinese threshold.

The recommendation of policy borrowing or transfer indicates a hope for development in the education system. This is possible if the educators and administrative personnel expose a conscious attitude towards the career establishment of the students. As a matter of specification, if the personnel introduce mediclaims, the parents would be assured about the refined quality of the education in the schools and institutions. For this, the schools and the institutions need financial flexibility.

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