Comparative cultures: Education in ten countries.
This paper describes a course, Comparative Cultures, developed by Dr. Carol Browning over the past seven years of teaching in Japanese universities. This course compares the practices and philosophies of Japanese, Chinese and American preschool education. It also examines family structure, the changing role of women, and early childhood socialization in India, selected Middle Eastern, African, and European countries. Every society educates its children to become effective members of that particular culture. From birth to marriage this socialization process focuses upon developing productive citizens. By examining both the formal and non-formal education of a society the norms, values, assumptions, and philosophies of that culture become apparent.
Preschool education reflects the society it serves. As the number of women in the work force grows worldwide and the extended family diminishes, many parents in industrialized societies feel increasing pressure to give their children an academic head start. They are turning to preschools to nurture, socialize and educate their young children. Many developing countries have no formal preschools. Their early childhood socialization process is based upon traditional methods. Some of these societies are struggling to find a balance between their traditional customs and education. Dr. Browning believes that Japanese university students are curious about the world beyond their borders, and motivated to acquire more than a superficial understanding about how other societies function. Comparative Cultures addresses these needs. Few textbooks do. In addition, Japan is placed in international perspective so students clarify their ethnocentric bias, learning more about themselves and their own culture.Human beings, no matter where they live, face the same basic needs: to eat, to work, to play, to get along with others. Learning how others respond to these needs foster a sense of empathy, a feeling of identity, with human beings everywhere. It also gives students an expanded vision of who they are, because they will place themselves in an international perspective, understanding more about the common humanity that all people share. Self-knowledge may be the ultimate justification for studying about others.
How and to what extent are women and men treated differently in faculty hiring in Taiwan? Objective and Theoretical Framework.
The purpose of this study is to analyse empirically how and to what extent women and men are treated differently in faculty hiring in the higher education system of Taiwan. More specifically, it is concerned with examining how prevalent gender-based discrimination in faculty hiring is in Taiwanese universities and how the hiring or selection process may work against women there. Discrimination against women in higher education in Taiwan seemed likely, because higher education is an 'attractive' occupation, in Strober's terms (Strober 1990, 1987,1984). This study posits that because of the relative attractiveness of the university teaching occupation in Taiwan, male faculty members perceive that their interest is best served if women, because of their lower status characteristics, are kept out of the faculty as far as possible. Women may be kept out through the mechanisms of the social/information network and/or biased evaluation of women applicants' achievements and competence.
This social/information network of men, overlapping with the traditional social structure, operates to minimise women's access to information abut the job market; while the maintenance of double standards for evaluating men and women results in biased evaluation of women's abilities. These two mechanisms together may lead to persistent gender discrimination against women in faculty hiring, which results in disproportionately fewer women on university faculties in Taiwan. On the other hand, since faculty members in higher education institutions are generally highly educated, better informed and represent the elite levels of the society, and many Taiwanese faculty members have lived abroad and received western social and cultural influences, they may be expected to be less willing to exercise the traditional prejudice or discrimination against women. Which of these forces is dominant in the current Taiwanese situation is unclear, as there have been no systematic studies to assess it. Therefore, it seems important and timely to empirically examine the question: How and to what extent are women and men treated differently in faculty hiring in Taiwan? This paper describes a study which provides data on this issue.
A comparison of collectivism/individualism of college students in Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, China and U.S.
Military education reform in Taiwan: An examination of a new system.
As a result of rapid economic development, Taiwan has experienced a drastic social change and is approaching to a more diverse society. This is also the case in Taiwanese military system which has been in a period of rapid transition because of the changing profile of military personnel and structure. The current study examines military education reform in Taiwan, especially dealing with issues, such as the new experimental program, i.e. the American ROTC program (Reserve Officers' Training Corps) will be adjusted in Taiwanese military education and what its impact will be on education and society. The study based on a survey among military cadets and officers (N=2545) in 1995 will reveal some important issues in the military education reform in Taiwan. It will also serve as a good example of educational adoption in other developing countries.
Foreign language acquisition in Taiwan: A case study.
This case study is an attempt to access Chinese students' beliefs about English learning acquisition. It examined what their beliefs are, and compared them to those of teachers as well as students in cross cultural settings (Keru, 1995; Horwitz, 1988). A total of 224 cadets at the Chinese Military Academy served as subjects: 209 males and 15 females. More than 60 American students who were studying in Taiwan were also part of the study. An 84-item questionnaire dealing with the student's background, motivation, attitude, beliefs, strategy and anxiety was used. MANOVA, Tukey test, multiple regression, and Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient were processed by SPSS. The result of the case study will be discussed as well as Taiwanese Language policy generally.
Art education in Taiwan: Localisation, internationalisation, and multiculturalism.
Talk of 'localisation' and 'internationalisation' in the 1990s Taiwan is not a rehashing of hackneyed themes - it is the crystallisation and development of fresh thinking. Dramatic changes on the global level and in local society have opened up new horizons and engendered an era of rethinking and redepartures. Internationalisation is no longer a race toward international progress rooted firmly in local culture. The call to 'make inroads into international art' was heard in Taiwan as early as the 1950s. Why then, four decades later, are we still drifting with the current?
'Internationalisation' is an inevitable trend in the era of the global village. At issue is how we define 'internationalisation'. If 'internationalisation' means subservience to power politics or monopolistic business mechanisms, then it is nothing more than the window dressing of cultural hegemony. For internationalisation to be genuinely inclusive and accommodate the cultural claims of different regions and races, a matter-of-fact precondition must be met: the artists and art of non-Western countries must autonomously make their weight felt and their voices heard. Only so can multicultural forces play a role in reshaping the post Cold War world. The localisation movement in Taiwanese art was not a chance occurrence: it has emerged gradually over time, the product of historical currents. Historically, Taiwan has been repeatedly infringed and violated by foreign powers, and the islanders' autonomous cultural consciousness has been repeatedly suppressed. Today, after many centuries of gradual progress, we have finally arrived at the opportunity for reform without bloodshed. Taiwan's people have come to the realisation that the power to shape their destiny lies in their own hands. In the 1980s. Taiwanese art saw a localisation movement of unprecedented vitality, a movement I feel was a necessary development. Of course 'localisation' is a relative term.
Countries around the world have experienced similar movements at various stages of their historical development, though the movements may have been called by different names. In some countries, especially economically advanced nations, localisation is no longer an issue; it is already a thing of the past. Since Taiwan has not gone through such a stage, I believe it is necessary to champion this cause today.
Paradigm shift of general education in Taiwan: A critical review.
From 'common courses' to 'general education', Taiwan's higher education has witnessed various stages in her national development in terms of political reform, economic growth and social transformation. From the view of exchange theory, education has been nothing but power and wealth in traditional Chinese society. By definition, exchange refers to a process of 'give and take' in terms of political, economic and social return. Within this exchange system, general education, as a biggest part of the education, has been playing an indispensable role in producing both positive and negative exchanges in political, economic and social aspects. Treating education as a production machine in Taiwan, the state, a national resource distributor, has been running the universities in order to help achieve her national development. In this sense, faculty members at universities are regarded to be knowledge producers and students be knowledge-consumers. This delicate relationship is particularly conspicuous in the practices of general education in Taiwan. This paper intends to apply the concept of 'exchange' to analyze the roles played by the state, university, faculty members and students in the political, economic and social contexts of Taiwan.
A study of the daily activities among junior high school teachers in Taiwan.
The study examined the daily teaching activities among the junior high school teachers across Taiwan. Classroom observations, interviews, and survey questionnaires with teachers were implemented in order to gather data regarding the types and frequencies of teaching activities within and outside classroom. It was found:
A snapshot of China's export education: Japanese students in Shanghai.
In the late 1970's China's universities designed for overseas students began re-admitting students who paid fees for tuition. Over the next decade, efforts were made to attract foreign students for a range of short courses, particularly in the fields of language and culture, and to run courses for what were essentially educational tourist groups. These programs built up numbers steadily, and opportunities for closer international university cooperation began in the field of shared course work. The tragic events of 1989 ended much of this cooperation as international groups withdrew or terminated programs. When cooperation was resumed in the early 1990's, it was also shaped by the opening up (under tight conditions) of China's service industries to the market place. Consequently fee for service returns were used to justify some international activities. Agencies concerned with international activities were also expected to contribute to their own upkeep. One of the most interesting recent developments has been the bachelor degree programs in Chinese, culture and business offered to Japanese students in several major Chinese universities. This paper presents a brief assessment of this activity in Shanghai, its strengths and problems at the initial stage.
Title: to be notified.
The importance of further emphasising the development of higher teacher education in China using the experience of other countries as reference. Despite progress achieved in the decades since the founding of the People's Republic of China, the overall level of education in China is still lower compared to that of other countries in the world.In the world today, educational level directly affects the overall development of a country. China, a developing country with a huge population and relatively limited resources, will not achieve her four modernisations if the quality of her people's education is not markedly improved. Promoting education is the only solution. Now every country is confronting fierce international competition and challenges posed by a new technology revolution. Economic competition between countries is to a large extent competition of science and technology, and of the educational quality of the people. In the final analysis it is the top priority task of China to raise the quality of the Chinese nation by developing education.The paper suggests that China should use the experience of other countries as reference and further emphasise the importance of developing higher teacher education.
For example, nothing influenced the development and expansion of higher education for the masses more than the land-grant college movement in the history of America's higher education. The development of higher education in the second half of the last century promoted the development of agriculture and industry in America at a high speed, and made the American economy surpass Great Britain's in less than half a century, thus becoming the most advanced industrialised country in the world. Higher teacher education is a weak link in China, and as such it has limited the development of basic education in China. China should research the experience of America and Japan in developing her higher teacher education and invest large amounts of capital in this area as well as basic education. In this way more and more higher quality teachers will be trained and the educational level and quality of the whole Chinese nation will be raised in the near future.
Universities and the initiation of social action in modern China.
This paper reflects on the role of universities in three main periods of modern Chinese history. It first considers the character of the universities that took form in the republican period and the nature of their action in society under the Nationalist government, highlighting the ways in which their constitution and legal status differed from the patterns of either the imperial learning institutions or the shuyuan during the Qing dynasty. The second part of the paper deals with higher education under the Communist government, as it was reorganised to fit into the macro planning patterns and mechanisms of a Soviet-oriented socialist state. Comparisons are made with both Nationalist and the Qing dynasty periods. Finally, the paper considers contemporary Chinese universities and offers some reflections on the possibilities and constraints they face within the conditions of 'market socialism', as they are given the status of 'legal persons' and encouraged to be pro-active in responding to newly emerging economic and social needs.
Chinese higher learning: The transition process from classical knowledge patterns to modern disciplines and academic structures 1860 to 1910.
This paper considers three phases in the introduction of Western concepts and patterns of knowledge to China:
Educational changes in Asian societies in transition: Empirical research and theory building.
The paper is intended to present an overview on current academic discourse on the transformation of formerly highly state-planned economies towards more market-oriented systems. Mainly based on what has been published by political scientists in Europe and the US the paper will discuss problems of the terminology (transformation vs. transition) and interpretation of concepts for classifying change in societies in transition. In addition, results from the author's most recent research on educational change in China, Hong Kong, the Republic of Kirgistan and Mongolia will be presented and findings will be discussed in the light of the conceptual frame of transition.
Criteria to select school sites for elementary provisional teachers.
The main purpose of this study was to examine the criteria to select school sites for elementary provisional teachers. This study employed self-devised questionnaires on the educational professors of teacher's college, administrators and supervisors of Ministry of Education and Bureau of Education, principals, grade principals, elementary teachers and elementary provisional teachers, who graduated from teacher's college in 1994. The copies of questionnaires dispatched were 1,750 in total, and 995 among them were recollected; hence the percentage of the copies shipped back yielded 56. 86%. Effectual copies among the answered questionnaires amounted to 907, accounting for 91.6% of collected copies.
The finding showed that: Criteria to select school sites for elementary provisional teachers should bear 29 standards in the seven areas depicted below, according to the order of importance respectively:
The reform of general education at universities in Taiwan: A reference from American experience.
General education at universities in Taiwan has been considered and discussed seriously in the recent years, Similarly, general education at American universities has being reformed, particularly from the middle of 1980's. For the purpose of reforming the general education at universities in Taiwan, it is important to take the experience of American universities as reference. This paper categories the various ideas or theories of general education at American universities into three: the Idealism/Perennialism, Progressivism/pragmatism, and Essentialism.
The recent general education reform at American universities are mainly stemming from the examination and reflection of general education in the 1960's-1970's which is a 'Disaster Area' for most of American universities. Taiwan is confronting the same situation at present. The approaches and issues of the reform focus on the content, coherence, commonality, and comprehensiveness of curriculum. In addition to curriculum, the teaching and learning of general education are another remarkable reforms. For improving teaching, faculty development, research, and faculty evaluation are organised and implemented much more effective than ever. For the aims of both breadth and depth of general education, students are encouraged to study more advanced, interdisciplinary courses. Freshman seminar, house seminar, global studies, multiculture studies, independent studies, etc, are new teaching and learning experience at American Universities.
Further, administration, resource, student residence, and campus building are considered and evaluated more positive than ever to general education. From the experience of general education at American universities, some inspirations for reforming general education at universities in Taiwan are as following:
The perception of teacher in traditional Chinese culture.
While in recent years educators in Western world began to discover the uniqueness and values of educational practices in Eastern cultures, the teachers' role, one of the dominant factors that shapes the characteristics of teaching practice, was always left out and not touched on. This paper attempts to explore, by seeking evidence from history between the eighth century BC to the third century AD, that some predominant characteristics of Chinese teachers' role have long roots in history. And this will probably help us to gain a better understanding of the formation of the Chinese tradition in education.
This paper argues that teaching in China is a very special profession. The social status of teacher was not so much judged by wealth or power. Instead, teacher was the only profession which was considered to be nearly as important as oneOs parents in the Confucianism tradition, and this was partially resulted from the needs of the ruling class. This paper further argues that teacher in such superior social status enjoyed a high esteem. In order to sustain such status, requirement of teacher both in moral and academic standards were extraordinarily high. However, although teachers might not receive much in terms of income, they received wide respect from people, and their students were expected to follow the teachers' teaching strictly. These might help to explain the emphasis of intrinsic motivation of Chinese teachers, their authority and their common practice of teacher-centred teaching.
La Scolarisation Des Femmes a Taiwan Depuis Cent Ans.
Discussion on the problem of comparison of Sino-Western appellation.
The paper discusses the Problems of Comparison of Sino-Western Appellation from three points:
Rethinking the policy of teacher training in Taiwan.
China's education: Recent development and social implications.
In the post-Mao era, the reformers have taken significant steps to privatise social policy and social welfare. Revamping the social security system and commodifying social services have become more prominent since the mid-eighties. Despite the post-Mao leaders' discomfort about the term 'privatisation', signs of state withdrawal from the provision of social policy and welfare are clear.
The author argues that the emergence of private educational institutions indicates that China's educational development has gone through a similar process of privatisation or quasi-marketisation. This paper tries to examine how the flourishing of the market economy and the policy of decentralisation have affected China's educational developments. Specially, this paper discusses strategies adopted by the local governments and local educationalists to create far more learning opportunities by encouraging diversity in education, particularly allowing the development of private education. No longer solely relying on public schools, private educational institutions are becoming more prominent in the new socialist market system. Additionally, this paper attempts to examine the implications of the growth of private education in the mainland with special attention to the discussion about private challenges to public dominance.
The English curriculum in the People's Republic of China: Evolution and upheaval.
Argumentative writing in English among students of the Henan Province, China.
This is a study of the quality of argumentative writing in English by Chinese senior secondary students. Students in Year 12 in several schools were asked to write an essay on the following topics:
Why did you continue your education after graduation from junior high school? Do you think learning English is useful for Chinese students? Four hundred essays were collected. A sample of 100 essays was marked by experienced markers on the following criteria:
Our examination showed that while Berrill's assumptions were justified there were certain aspects of composition lacking notably in the students' writing. Analysis of the students' writing indicates that they have not been taught to acknowledge other points of view in their writing. They do not demonstrate even a cursory awareness of alternative points of view. This has important implications for the teaching of argumentative writing to Chinese adolescents. In particular attention should be paid to metadiscourse elements such as attitude markers, emphatics, hedges and narrators which should help L2 students to be critical in writing. Berrill, D.P.(1992) Issues of audience: egocentrism revisited. In R. Andrews (Ed) Rebirth of rhetoric: essays in language, culture and education.
PETERSON, Glen.
Department of History #1297 - 1873 East Mall Vancouver, B.C. Canada. V6T 1Z1
Education and society in 20th century China.
The purpose of this workshop is to present ideals for an interdisciplinary volume exploring the multiple and complex ways in which education has both shaped, and in turn been shaped by, changes in Chinese society through the twentieth century. The intention is to break down the 'academic Great Wall' that has separated the study of pre- and post 1949 China, and address fundamental issues of change and continuity in twentieth century Chinese life, and to view education as the 'entire process by which a culture transmits itself across generations.' (Bernard Bailyn, Education in the Forming of American Society (Cambridge, Mass., 1960). We have already identified five possible themes around which the volume may be organised:
Taiwan's educational development: the interpretations of modernisation theory and dependency theory.
The educational development in Taiwan has been influenced by foreign countries in many aspects, Although some influences were proved helpful to Taiwan's education, some were not so convincing. However, for Taiwan's to be a part of the world it is not possible for her to be isolated from other countries, and to create her own educational system and polices without reference to other countries, especially those advanced industrialised ones. Thus the way and methods to adopt and adapt foreign educational practices must be carefully examined. Reference to the theories of modernisation and dependency and the strengths and weaknesses of Taiwan's adopting foreign educational practises will be made. The assumptions:
Teaching, learning and reflective acting: A Dewey experiment in Chinese teacher education.
As a professor of philosophy and education at Columbia University, John Dewey mentored quite a few Chinese students in the early 20th century, who returned to China to become educational and political leaders, and who enthusiastically implemented his ideas in Chinese education. This paper illustrates how Tao Xingzhi, a former student of Dewey and a most prominent figure in the modern Chinese history of education, boldly experimented Dewey's philosophy in Chinese teacher education. Turning a 'half somersault' of Dewey's theories to conform to the social and educational conditions in China in the 1920s, Tao transformed DeweyOs 'school as society' into his 'society as school', Dewey's 'education as life' into his 'life as education', and Dewey's 'learning by doing' into his principle of the 'unity of teaching, learning, and reflective acting'.
On the basis of these principles, Tao established the famous Morning Village Normal School in a small rural teachers and a centre for village renewal: the students learned to run village schools by running village schools and the whole village became a learning community. The school broke the division between life and curriculum, levelled the wall between school and society, and extended its influence to the total economic, social, and political life of the village. Although Tao's experiment in the Morning Village lasted only for three years due to political pressures and military intervention, his efforts represented the most thorough and creative implementation of the Dewey philosophy in Chinese teacher education. Widely recognised as a viable solution to problems in Chinese teacher education and rural education and an avenue for national development and reconstruction, the Normal School was reestablished in 1949 and has continued to serve as a national experimental site for teacher education reform in China.
Today although Dewey's name and works are seldom mentioned in the explicit Chinese curriculum, his ideas on school as society, education as life, and learning by doing are still very much alive as evidenced by the firm implementation of Tao's principles in the educational practices of the Normal School, and through its modelling, in the large teacher education and rural education reform movements across the nation.
Postmodernism, postmodern culture and their implications for the education reform of Taiwan.
Postmodernism has been one of the major research interests in cultural studies for decades. Since 1980s postmodernism and its impact on education has been observed vigorously by some educational researches in the western countries. Although Taiwan is located culturally in the periphery of the world, it cannot resist the tide of postmodernism. The contemporary culture of Taiwan, especially the subculture of the teenagers is deeply affected by postmodernism, almost beyond the recognition and comprehension of their parents and teachers. Therefore, a further understanding of the basic attitudes and values of the teenagers and their effect on educational measures is one of the most needed educational research in the country. This study attempts to explore the extent to which the teenagers are affected by postmodernism and postmodern culture on the one hand, and the education reform measures proposed by the authorities concerned of Taiwan on the other with a view to examine the potential effectiveness the reform undergoing in Taiwan recently. Generally speaking, the objectives of this study are as follow:
Two cultures in the teacher education institutions in Taiwan. What is the desirable knowledge base for a competent teacher?
That has been a controversy among the teacher education community around the world for some centuries. Instead, this issue is comparatively quite new in Taiwan emerging after the government passed the new Teacher Education Law, which for the first time allowed all the higher education institutions, instead of the normal matter of fact, the faculty members in Taiwan's renowned teacher training institutions hold a wide variety of orientation toward how the school teachers should be prepared. This paper will trace the history of this implicit but existing conflict and will survey its recent development.
Enriching young adults workforce via professional continuing education - in the perspective of Taiwan's experiences.
Taiwan has been striving to upgrade the quality of its work force from manpower-oriented to technology-oriented productivity to compete in the global market. Professional continuing education (PCE) has been emphasised to achieve the above target under the facilitation of the Government's larger encouragement in adult continuing education since 1992. In the past, PCE was mainly used to cultivate young adult's second speciality to help them easily to get a job. At current, they are getting recommendations requiring for redesigning PCE to enforce more functions with the view of empowering young adults' continuing development by lifelong learning.
In this paper, the author will review this change in Taiwan via formulating a mulitple-dimension context and explore potential problems and direction for improvement. Taiwan's experiences in PCE for young adults could provide valuable reference for other OECD countries, especially developing ones.
Problems of China's national college entrance examination system in the development of the nation.
Since its reinstitution in 1977, China's National College Entrance Examination (NCEE) system has been functioning to select out secondary school graduates for higher education, to define school curricula, to guide secondary or even primary school teaching and learning activities, and to evaluate the quality of schools and teachers, etc. This study identifies problems resulting from the NCEE system and their impact on China's secondary and higher education. It argues that the NCEE system has oriented the nation's education and reorganized its secondary educational system via means of a two-track system, and it biases towards those high-score achievers, who might be just those with better opportunities to learn, or those with high score but low ability. Through the kind of students it selects for colleges and universities, the NCEE system has also influenced the nation's higher education to a large extent.The paper concludes that the NCEE system have caused serious problems not only in the educational development, but also in overall development of the country.
English language education and modernization in China.
This paper examines the relationship between English language education and modernisation at different historical stages in the context if China's politics, economy, and culture, with the focus on the post Cultural Revolution period. It is suggested and discussed in this paper that from the very beginning of its introduction into China, English language education has been associated with the effort to modernize China and to reach full equality with the outside world. However, the Chinese people are a history-conscious people. They have a deep sense of cultural pride and national identity,which they have always been trying hard to sustain. The history of English language education illustrates their dilemma of how to draw on Western science and technology, expertise, experience, etc., while still keeping 'Chinese essence' intact from Western influence. In addition, English language education in China has been enmeshed in China's political, economic, and cultural influences. It has gone through great variances in its treatment by both the government and the people - from outright rejection and reluctant acceptance to active promotion as a means of modernizing China. The great variances of its treatment reflect not only the broader contextual changes of the nation's politics, economy, and culture, but also the shift of the concepts of modernisation.
Beyond modernity and post-modernism towards 21st Century and its implication for Taiwan's education: A dialectic dialogue.
This paper would like to clarify the relationship between modernity and post-modernism. Therefore, the nature of modernity in terms of human reason will be dealt with first. Then the characteristics of modernity will be disclosed. They are: timing, progress and enlightenment. With these characteristics, the degercration from which the modernity leads human beings to go astray can be shown. It is the degeneration of people in the modern society that people thrash out the idea of post-modernism recently, though there is still lack of consensus on it. In this paper, the relation between modernity and post-modernism is taken to be a dialectic dialogue. That is, there are four reasons to leave post-modernism space to show up.
They are: human is limited; human beings are used to have a craving for materials rather than self-constrain; it comes dialectically with modernity for the post-modernism, according to the movement of human progress; post-modernism is pushed by human progress after people have learned from modernity.If the above argument can be accepted, then it can be said that modernity and post-modernism is Co-existed. Yet, post-modernism is coming up for the critique for the degeneration of modernity. In this way, post-modernism can be taken as an incentive for modern society towards a synthesised rational. It may also picture a more rational life for human beings in the 21th century. Then the inspiration of education from the synthesised national might be multicultural education.After clarifying the relationship between modernity and post-modernism, four movements for the education in Taiwan should go. There are:
The interaction between a socialist market economy and vocational education and training in China.
The economic reforms in China since 1978 have resulted in a remarkable economic growth. The guiding principle for further reforms in next 15 years is the transition from the traditional planned economy to a socialist market economy (SME) and the transition from an extensive economic growth model to an intensive model. The transitions have crucial impacts on labour market and the success of the transitions depends very much on the quality of the labour force. Vocational education and training (VET) is affected by the reforms and has a particular priority. Based on recent probing interviews with 21 policy-makers and research experts and surveys of 110 employers, 1400 employees, 125 VET school principals and 129 teachers in China, the paper analyses the impacts of a SME on labour market policies and practices; the role of VET in human resource development and the challenges VET is facing. To suit the needs of the SME for qualified labour force, fundamental change of the VET system is necessary. Solutions need to be found around a set of basic principles, including: the coordination of the management of VET; the balance of quantitative expansion and qualitative improvement; the linkages between VET and general education, higher education as well as lifelong education; the modernisation of curricula and teaching methods; the involvement of employers in the process of VET; the role of VET in the reemployment of the unemployed and in the employment of women.
Chinese higher education reform: From the 'State Model' to the 'Social Model'.
At present, the rapid economic, social and political changes of China provide its higher education with a good chance to develop. at meantime, higher education is also facing a severe challenge of two main respects. One is a great rise of enrollment in quantity in order to meet the increasing demand for higher education of the youth, the other is a transition of operating mechanics so as to suit the plurality of the society. Since 1949, Chinese higher education has always been highly centralized and unified. It may appear quite efficient, but rather weak in response flexibility to the changing society and lacks academic independence. The current social development requires higher education to be developed freely in various forms and types including private universities. This creates good opportunities for higher education to develop with academic independence. Great changes have taken place in Chinese higher education since the 1980s, especially since 1985 when the Central Committee of the Communist Party issued The Decision on Reform of educational system. But this is basically under the plan and control of the central government, and appears quite slow and conservative compared with the self-running reform of economic system and social life. Therefore, Chinese higher education is under pressure to undergo a fundamental turning in order to take the two challenges mentioned above. Drawing the experience of the history of higher education development of Japan and some other countries in the world, we can become convinced that Chinese higher education needs an overall turning in models, which I'd like to refer to as turning from the 'State Model' to the 'Social Model', so as to go with the tide of the current economic and social development. This paper covers following five aspects.
Reflection of the idea of a university and concepts of communist society on Chinese universities' institutional plans.
The idea of a university and concepts of communist society are two sets of different values from each other. However, Chinese universities exist as a meeting place of these two value types. How Chinese universities are changing with the social reforms and how near they are turning to the western idea of a university are reflected in their institutional plans. This paper makes contrast between the two value types in three aspects of knowledge, intellectuals, and the roles of universities in society. Then is discusses their reflection on two Chinese universities' plans through comparison of the similarities and differences.
A consideration to adopt contents of 'Common Curriculum' in China: A perspective of an overseas Chinese female student.
An internationally common problem of education at present is, perhaps, how to educate students to live and work with success in a fast changing world. This problem is particularly crucial for the developing China which is just in a great social transition from the previous state-planned economy to a socialist market economy. This paper suggest that China can consider to adopt some contents of 'common curriculum' as Ontario province, Canada, is now implementing in their education system, which contains not only academic subjects but also personal and social studies, i.e. employability skills, life-long learning skills, global perspective, and values. This paper also discusses the necessity and feasibility of the adoption to 'common curriculum' in Chinese context.
Adult education in China: Achievements and problems.
This paper falls into two parts. The first part gives a brief and objective account of the achievements and problems of adult education in China in the past decade. The second part tries to work out practical solutions to some of the most important problems in adult education.
Democracy, the individual and civil society in Chinese higher education.
This paper explores the interface between democracy and education in Chinese higher education. Using a qualitative method with particular focus on a case study, it examines two important determinants of member participation in the Chinese educational setting: a sympathetic leader and a strong civil society. Democracy at 'Southern Tertiary' was dependent on the school leadership. It was not institutionalised. When the leaders changed, avenues for student and faculty participation were closed. The school did not possess the type of independent groups that enable democracy. The paper explores the relationship between civil society and democracy, and suggests that the mere existence of independent organisations is in itself insufficient to ensure democracy.