Decision of the State Council regarding the deepening of education reform and the comprehensive promotion of quality education (suzhi jiaoyu)

This document appears to be one of the strongest documents that i am aware of so far from the highest echelons of the central government encouraging brave experimentation in education reform and raising a clarion call for the need for greater creativity and innovation in all things educational. the whole document is riddled through with slogans that can now be found on school buildings around the nation.

the document follows the familiar structure of policy documents i analyze... an introductory paragraph followed by specific points (in this case 26) divided into several main sections (in this case 4) The introductory paragraph can be a key quotation used in my paper:

"in modern society, science and technology are advancing at breakneck
speed, we can already gain an inkling of the emerging knowledge economy, global
competition is increasing in ferocity every day. Education has a fundamental
position in the development of national strength. the strength of a nation
is coming to rely more and more on the quality of the labor force and on the
number and quality of various types of human talent. This makes the task of
cultivating and training our nation's 21st century generation of "new
people" all the more urgent. Our nation finds itself at a
critical moment in the work of building the system of the socialist market
economy and realizing the goals of modernizing construction. The
tremendous achievements in the cause of education reform and development since
the founding of new China 50 years ago, and especially since the start of
opening and reform, have attracted rapt attention of onlookers. However, in the face of current circumstance, due to both objective and subjective reasons, our education concepts,
education system, eductional structure, models of cultivating human talent,
stagnant educational content and educational methods, are all influencing the holistic development of children and youth and are not suited
to the needs of rasing the suzhi of the nation's people. The entire
communist party, the entire society must take the overall interests of
the prosperous development of the socialist cause and the great
renaisssance of the Chinese people as a starting point, draw on the guidance of
Deng Xiaoping theory, comprehensively implement the spirit of the 15th national
people's congress, deepen education reform, comprehensively promote suzhi
jiaoyu, and construct a vital system of socialist education with chinese
characteristics in order to implement the lines of action required by the
"revitalize the nation through science and education" movement to lay a
foundation for the development of human talent and knowledge"


The document is then divided into the following four sections:

1. Comprehensively promote suzhi jiaoyu, cultivate socialist "new people" adapted to the needs of the 21st century modernizing construction

"implementing suzhi jiaoyu is the comprehensive implementation of the
party's educational directives, with the raising of the suzhi of the national
population as its main guiding principle, and a focus on the cultivation fo
students creativity and ability to apply knowledge in practice to raise up the
successors to the project to socialist construction who "have ideals, have
morals, have culture, have disicpline" and are developed in a holistic way with
morals, intellect, physical health and artistic sensibility.

In order to comprehensively promote suzhi jiaoyu we must "face
modernization, face the world, face the future" and enable educators to continue
to learn the unity of scientific culture and cultivated thought, persist in
learning the unity of book knowledge and immersing oneself in service to
the society, and persist in the unity of the possession of high ideals and
arduous struggle."

2. Deepen educational reform, create conditions for the implementation of suzhi jiaoyu

3. Perfect structure, construct a high quality teaching force for the compreshensive promotion of suzhi jiaoyu

4. strengthen collaboration between the nation's leaders, the entire communist party, entire society, to work hard to advance the new phase of suzhi jiaoyu

I endeavored to fit the paragraphs of this document into the three categories of economic development, sociopolitical control and social justice. Again i feel that it is challenging as these goals are very conflated in this document.

there are a couple of interesting instances that hint at the implementation of global institutions and also evidence of techniques for the "purposeful institutionalization of educational ideologies" .

total pargraphs 26 plus 1

econ dev 21
sociopolitical control 6
social justice 17

progressive ideologies 5

Economic development

the introductory paragraph vividly sets up an urgent argument for educational development for national strength and international competitiveness in the emerging global knowledge economy.

again the themes of learning knowledge relevant to the economy and to production are emphasized, and the need for creativity and independent thinking, and a pathbreaking spirit.

the image of the healthy citizen may also be included in an overall vision of a strong new generation of citizens capable of high productivity in the new millenium.

in paragraph 7:

"the integration of education and productive labor is an important road to the holistic development of human talent. Each level and each type of education must start from reality, strengthen and improve the productive capacity of students and practical education, expose them to nature, make them understand society, and cultivate the habits of loving labor and the spirit of arduous struggle. ..."

the decentralization and efficiency theme appears again which is connected to globalized "neoliberal" policies?

the notion of lifelong learning also appears to target the raising of worker quality and productivity.

the encouragement of relationships between higher education and production industries and scientific research. these kinds of integrations and relationships are to take place in rural areas as well with the uniting of "liang ji" with production technology.

Paragraph 25 "transform traditional ideas about human resources, establish a culture where high quality is emphasized in the use of human resources and actual capacity is emphasized."

Sociopolitical control

the sweeping lofty vision of this new chinese person that is to be raised up is also a new chinese person who is loyal to the chinese communist party and will carry on the legacy of socialist construction.

there is the image of the person with the "four haves"
and the invocation of slogans from leaders of the past to emphasize the importance of the communist canon.

the assurance that in the midst of all this change the implementation of suzhi jiaoyu requires that all levels of education increase their emphasis on "moral education" with marxist theory, maoist thought, and dengxiaoping theory as guiding principles. the emphasis on the development of a "scientific" world view and view of human nature.

paragraph 3 "Relevant education in patriotism, collectivism, and socialism must continue along with education in the excellent classical traditions of chinese society and in revolutionary traditions, and in ideals, ethics and civilized habits, chinese contemporary history and the current situation in the nation and around the world, as well as education in democratic law. integrate the learning of chinese national excellent culture with the learning of excellent culture from around the world. higher education must go one step further in ensuring that deng xiaoping theory "enters the textbook, enters the classroom, enters the students minds". vocational education must lay emphasis on training in professional ethics."

the list continues in the next paragraph and includes items such as pscyhological health, cultivation of will power, spirit of arduous struggle, ability to adapt to the society. strenghtening of interethnic unity, awareness of national security, military training, campus spiritual civilization, avoidance of all superstitions and other ideas that might harm the students...etc.

there is a sense in which health and artisitic sensibilties are also part of this moral political education.

moral political training for teachers is an important aspect of the raising up of high suzhi teaching force.

paragraph 17 "teachers must love the party, love socialism, and be loyal to the cause of the education of the people; they must establish the correct view of education, quality and human talent

the document ends with an invocation to the high priests of the chinese communist party:

"Under Jiang Zemin who constitutes the core leadership of the central communist party, raise up the great flag of deng xiaoping theory and resolve to make an ever greater contribution to the realization of macro goals of socialist modernizing construction and the renaissance of the chinese people."

the very last sentence in the document is rather cryptic:

"Implementation fo the spirit of this document in the schools of the military system will be left to the discretion of the central military committee."

Social justice

paragraph 1 (3) "comprehensive implementation of suzhi jiaoyu requries persisting in takign care of the needs of all students, to create the conditions for the all roudn developmetn of children, and protect the fundamental right of all school-aged children to obtain an education, must respect the educational principles and characteristics of children's physical and pschological development, enable students to develop in a lively, vivid and active way."

is the concept of suzhi jiaoyu itself a kind of approach to developing children's welfare, the notion of healthy holistic development, also healthy bodies and minds?

the reduction of student's study burden.

the emphasis on the universalization of compulsory education and the elimination of illiteracy, the push to raise educational enrollments for minorities. increasing access to high school and university. removing entrance examinations to middle school.

is greater freedom for universities a kind of increasing democracy? see para 11 (3)

paragraph 13 removing accountability of testing for the evaluation of schools?

mechanisms for enticing teachers to teach in rural schools. improving teachers living conditions and salaries.

Institutionalization of progressive ideologies

there are several paragraphs of note in this document regarding the progressive ideologies and their institutionalization.

The following paragraph is key to my dissertation study of teaching methods.

paragraph 4: educational concepts must change for intellectual education work, there must be a reform in the training of human talent, we must enthusiastically begin the use of heuristic methods and discussion, in order to stimulate students independent thinking and their innovative and creative consciousness; we must earnestly improve the quality of teaching. we must make students become aware of and understand the process of knowledge production and development. we must cultivate students scientific spirit and creative habits of thought, place emphasis on students ability to collect and manage information, ability to gather new knowledge, ability to analyze and solve problems, and their ability to express themselves in spoken and written language, and their ability to cooperate in unity and to engage in social acitivity."

This next paragraph i feel is hard evidence regarding the "purposeful institutionalization of educational ideologies" through the calling up of the media and the reach to which the document calls for the ideas of suzhi jiaoyu to penetrate society.

paragraph 26: "the comprehensive implementation of suzhi jiaoyu, is a deep reform of our country's educational cause, it is a matter that concerns every department, and deeply affects and touches upon all aspects of systematic projects in the society. we must further strengthen the party work in the schools, give full expression to the role of the party members as leading models in the implementation of suzhi jiaoyu. Through the direction provided by appropriate discussion in the media we must deeply motivate all sectors of society to be concerned with, provide their support, and devote themselves to the work of suzhi jiaoyu. school, family and society must communicate with each other, enthusiastically join forces, and create a new situation for the implementation of suzhi jiaoyu"