Inspired by the author’s observations of the language curriculum as a practising teacher for the past 20 years, this book addresses how the high school Chinese language and literacy (Yuwen) curriculum in China was controlled and directed in the post-Mao era. Examining the social and political domination from 1980 to 2010, the book offers insights into how teachers and schools responded to the top-down curriculum change in their teaching practice. This book discusses some of the most important questions concerning China and its education system: What changes have occurred in the Chinese language and literacy curricula; how and why the changes have occurred; who has been in control of the process and outcome; and what impacts the curriculum changes may bring not only to China but to the international sectors that "export" education and degrees to China and Chinese students. The author provides answers to these questions crucial to both the contemporary Chinese society and the students who come out of that system. This critical inquiry of the Yuwen curriculum and its implementation provides a valuable and timely showcase for understanding the ideology of China's future generation and the social and political transformation in the past three decades. In addition to researchers, this book is expected to have impact on policymakers in China and beyond, where Chinese migrants and international students constitute a substantial learning population.

In the first decade of the twenty-first century, the People's Republic of China experienced dramatic growth and expansion that altered the educational environment of children. Rapid economic development increased prosperity and educational opportunities for children expanded in a wealthier society. Yet, a by-product of rising wealth was rising inequality. While the children of the emerging urban middle and elite classes enjoyed new prosperity, the children of hte persistently poor in rural communities continued to experience challenges such as food insecurity, illness, hardships of family separation, and migrant life on the margins of the cities. This time period saw a large resource gap emerge between the home conditions of poor rural children compared with those of their wealthier urban counterparts. This book highlights the complexities China has experienced in seeking to extend full educational access to rural children— including rural- to- urban migrant and ethnic minority children—during a momentous period in China. Chapters delve into the experiences, perceptions, strategies, and diffi culties of rural- origin children and their families in the school system, and lay bare the challenges of policy initiatives designed to support rural education. We hope the experiences detailed here will be of interest to students and scholars of rural educational policy and practice in China and worldwide.

Preferential Education Policies in Multi-ethnic China: National Rhetoric, Local Realities explores the cultural logic of China’s preferential policy measures. Similar in premise but different in practice and philosophy to American affirmative action, the preferential policies evoke controversy on all sides: from those who see the measures as insufficient to address problems of educational disparities between ethnic groups, and from those who see the measures as "reverse discrimination." Yamada shows how the policy measures attempt to manage ethnic-based contradictions and appease both majority and minority populations.

This book examines the interactions and dynamics between one cross-border joint-university and its social environment in the process of institutional transplantation and organizational adaptation. This study specifically demonstrates the interplays between the joint-university and its key players, including partners, government, market, parents, and the general public. By examining a variety of tensions between the joint-university and its key social actors, this research suggests a concept of "organizational dilemma" to capture the characteristics embedded in cross-border joint-universities in mainland China, and as an analytical model to unpack the tensions giving rise to the dilemmatic feature.

This book chronicles the author’s application of critical pedagogy in Hong Kong secondary schools serving students from working-class families of South Asian heritage, so-called ‘ethnic minorities’ in the local context. Soto used concepts such as banking pedagogy, generative themes, liberatory dialogue, and transformative resistance, to first understand students’ school, online, and community experiences, and then to reshape his teaching of English and humanities subjects to address the students’ academic, social, and emotional needs. This critical ethnography is set against educational reforms in Hong Kong, which re-orientated schools towards developing a knowledge-economy workforce, increased privatization and competition in the school system, aimed to build national identification with China, and sought to address growing inequality in a territory known for wealth disparity. While these reforms opened opportunities for implementing student-centered pedagogies in schools and increased student access to tertiary education, ethnic minority youth faced ongoing economic and social marginalization on top of academic difficulties. The central narrative captures everyday struggles and contradictions arising from intersections of neoliberal reforms, institutional school histories, students’ transnational realities, and collective efforts for equity and social justice. In the course of the book a parallel story unfolds, as the author explores what it means to be a critical teacher and researcher, and is reborn in the process. The book’s ‘on the ground’ story is hopeful, yet tempered, in discussing the limits and possibilities for critical pedagogy. It will be of a great resource for researchers, teacher educators, and pre-service and in-service teachers who are interested in the topic.

Papers presented at a seminar held at La Trobe University on 3 Dec 1978: Language problems and reforms in China. L-N Li; Educating successors to which revolution? R F Price; Youth: aspirations and actuality. J Fyfield.

The post-Mao period has witnessed rapid social and economic transformation in all walks of Chinese life – much of it fuelled by, or reflected in, changes to the country’s education system. This book analyses the development of that system since the abandonment of radical Maoism and the inauguration of ‘Reform and Opening’ in the late 1970s. The principal focus is on formal education in schools and conventional institutions of tertiary education, but there is also some discussion of preschools, vocational training, and learning in non-formal contexts. The book begins with a discussion of the historical and comparative context for evaluating China’s educational ‘achievements’, followed by an extensive discussion of the key transitions in education policymaking during the ‘Reform and Opening’ period. This informs the subsequent examination of changes affecting the different phases of education from preschool to tertiary level. There are also chapters dealing specifically with the financing and administration of schooling, curriculum development, the public examinations system, the teaching profession, the phenomenon of marketisation, and the ‘international dimension’ of Chinese education. The book concludes with an assessment of the social consequences of educational change in the post-Mao era and a critical discussion of the recent fashion in certain Western countries for hailing China as an educational model. The analysis is supported by a wealth of sources – primary and secondary, textual and statistical – and is informed by both authors’ wide-ranging experience of Chinese education. As the first monograph on China's educational development during the forty years of the post-Mao era, this book will be essential reading for all those seeking to understand the world’s largest education system. It will also be crucial reference for educational comparativists, and for scholars from various disciplinary backgrounds researching contemporary Chinese society.