Summary

China’s Ministry of Education has recently announced its annual work plan and list of priorities for 2021. Along with the development of a new five-year plan covering the period to 2025, a number of the plan’s priorities are relevant to international education cooperation with the UK, including plans to revise regulations on transnational education in the country; an increased focus on interdisciplinary research; and support for a number of regional initiatives that include significant internationalization elements.

The list below contains a number of relevant highlights for UK education institutions. It does not attempt to provide a full summary of every aspect of the plan.

1. Developing the 14^th Five Year Plan

The announcement includes a number of priorities which will make up part of this plan, which will focus on creating a high-quality educational development system that supports life-long learning and skills development. These priorities include several regional areas of focus, including building capacity for regional rejuvenation through HEIs in northeast China; coordinating Beijing-based HEIs’ participation in the development of Xiong’an New Area; optimizing HE provision in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area; accelerating, monitoring and evaluating educational modernization in the Yangtze River Delta region; and supporting economic and social development in the Yellow River region.

2. Regulated development of private education

Priorities for 2021 include improvements to regulations surrounding private education, including drafting regulations on inspection of private primary and secondary schools, developing new guidelines for student enrolment at private academic senior high schools. At the higher education level the MoE will accelerate plans to convert semi-independent affiliated colleges to regular higher education institutions, which typically involves converting them to private universities.

3. Improve educational governance by law

Alongside reforms to legislation on domestic basic, higher and vocational education, the MoE aims to amend the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Chinese-Foreign Cooperation in Running Schools, which govern transnational education in the country. The MoE also plans to research and develop new evaluation and management measures for Sino-foreign cooperative educational programmes in the country.

4. Promote high-quality education internationalization

Aside from the TNE legislation mentioned above, the MoE aims to promote Chinese education abroad through developing pilot Chinese international schools overseas, supporting the development of online Chinese teaching platforms, and advancing the development of “Luban Workshops” (essentially vocationally-orientated Confucius Institutes). The MoE will also continue to support educational cooperation through the Belt and Road Initiative, hold international conferences and high-level people-to-people dialogue summits, implement new measures on employment of foreign teaching staff, and optimize systems for Chinese students studying abroad.

The MoE will also support education internationalization plans in specific regions including the Hainan Free Trade Port, Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, Yangtze River Delta region and Xiong’an New Area.

5. Develop China’s vocational education system

As in the previous few years, vocational education plays a major role in the MoE’s 2021 priorities. The MoE plans to achieve its target to increase higher vocational enrolment by 2 million in 2020-2021, as well as to improve the student enrolment system for higher vocational education, advance pilot plans for vocationally-related bachelor’s degrees, and explore new apprenticeship systems.

6. Improve quality in higher education

The MoE has listed a number of priorities in higher education, including supporting the development of new subjects and interdisciplinary studies across a broad range of fields; implementing existing development plans such as the World Class Universities & Disciplines project and the “Double 10,000 Courses” project; supporting new high-level institutes in the areas of public health, microelectronics and specialised software; drawing up long-term talent development plans in basic subjects and exploring combined bachelors-masters-doctoral programmes in these subjects; rejuvenating higher education in Central and Western China; and continue to convert qualified bachelor’s-level HEIs to application-oriented institutions. Support for graduate employment is also an important aspect of the plan.

7. Enhancing systems for science and research

Priorities in this field include promoting inter-disciplinary research and establishing a cohort of inter-disciplinary centres at selected HEIs. The MoE will continue to prioritise research into subjects which align with strategies for national security and economic and social development. Other priorities in the research area include advancing commercialisation and technology transfers from HEIs to industry, and pushing for substantial and high-level international technological collaboration.

8. Enhancing continuing education and life-long learning

The MoE will work with China’s Open University to deepen reform and move forward the development of academic credit banks for vocational education.

9. Other priorities

The MoE will continue to develop education informationisation and the “Internet + education” model’, implement existing plans for primary and secondary textbooks, and increase the importance of physical education by supporting inter-school competition and treating PE work as a factor when evaluating higher education institutions

Sources

1. http://www.moe.gov.cn/jyb_xwfb/moe_176/202102/t20210203_512420.html

2. http://www.moe.gov.cn/jyb_sjzl/moe_164/202102/t20210203_512419.html