China seeks to lower pressure on young students, but will it work?

Municipal governments’ latest efforts to reduce the study pressure placed on the nation’s youngest students comes in the wake of a tragic suspected suicide of an 11-year old girl in Shanghai, who fell to her death from a school window on the first day of semester.  Pressure within classrooms and at home are major psychological stress factors for young Chinese.

In a survey carried out by the China Youth and Childrens Research Center in 2007, 83.6% of the parents expected their children to rank within the top 15 in their class, three-quarters of respondents placed expectations on their children to achieve scores above 90%, and almost one in ten expected their children to achieve scores of 100% in all subjects. Such expectations at home further explain why, in a 2008 study by the Shanghai Academy of Educational Sciences, study pressure  and interpersonal relationships (perhaps in part due to study pressures and classroom mechanics, as well) are causing children most concern.

While expectations at home are a cause for concern, the education system itself defines the infrastructure and assessment mechanisms that have the effect of driving intense competition between students. Realising this, various municipal- and district-level governments are taking small steps to alleviate some of the pain.

National media agency Xinhua outlined district-level changes being effected in Shanghai as of this semester.

Jing’an district requires teachers to exercise a high degree of discretion with the nature and volume of homework assigned to students. In addition, teachers are being urged not to assign any homework to grade one and two students, and to instead design activities that can be completed in class.

Xuhui district aims to prioritise students’ homework burden by having teachers create their own exercises, rather than assigning large numbers of exercises from so-called ‘yi ke yi lian’ textbooks (these are books full of supplementary exercises for each level and each subject from primary to senior levels). Zhabei district is employing similar measures.

Luwan district is taking a more innovative approach, making Friday afternoons a set period of time for creative and practical exercises of the natural and social sciences. Beyond Shanghai, various other municipal- and district-level governments have been implementing guidelines designed to reduce study burden. But will they work without greater buy-in from parents and society in general? Are students being thoroughly understood and listened to?

Mr. Tang Haibuo, the head of Luwan district’s education department, highlighted this problem with a discussion on so-called Suzhi education, which aims to develop characteristics such as creative thinking and emotional intelligence, telling Xinhua, “The reason we were not able to carry out real Suzhi education in the past is because we were never brave enough to apportion time and space to Suzhi education, and grant some autonomy to students.”

The measures being implemented by many levels of government to reduce overall study burden are a start, and to be applauded. Governments and individual schools will play critical policy, infrastructural, assessment and enforcement roles. However, moves to relieve study pressure must also reach far deeper – into homes – where typically high expectations sow the seeds of immense stress for children.

The forthcoming 2020 education plan may address some of these issues, and we hope to see a much wider approach being employed – not just government policy, but public education campaigns, incentives and rewards – to achieve measurable, sustainable relief of study pressures to millions of students.