The State Council of China has issued the Education Development ‘15th Five-Year Plan’.
The plan calls for the gradual introduction of a basic education management system featuring “provincial-level coordination with counties as the main body and city-county integration.” It also requires the integrated design of a 12-year curriculum system for basic education and an enhanced supply of quality courses and resources.
For compulsory education, the plan explores extending the duration of compulsory education, deepening group-based school operations and the building of urban-rural school communities. Supervision and evaluation for high-quality and balanced development of county-level compulsory education will be conducted as prescribed, and balanced development at the city level will also be advanced in an orderly manner. A new round of improvement and capability enhancement for weak links in compulsory education will be implemented, aiming for full coverage of standardized compulsory education school construction. Boarding schools and necessary small-scale rural schools will continue to be well managed, and a special action for fair enrollment in primary and secondary schools will be carried out. The “double reduction” policy and improvement in teaching quality will be advanced in a coordinated way, with strengthened regular and long-term management of off-campus training and improved after-school service quality. A mechanism for predicting and warning about school-age populations will be established to expand educational resource supply in towns with net inflows of school-age children and in areas with weak foundations. The building of teams of class teachers and Young Pioneers counselors for compulsory education will be strengthened. Regions with the right conditions may also promote spring and autumn breaks for primary and secondary schools.
For high school education, the plan pushes for orderly reforms in senior high school entrance examinations, increasing the proportion of enrollment quotas from quality high schools allocated to junior middle schools, and piloting balanced allocation and registration-based enrollment where conditions permit, promoting diversified admissions. Comprehensive reform of the college entrance examination will deepen, building an examination and assessment content system that guides students’ holistic development, while optimizing the content and form of vocational education college entrance exams. Resources for regular high schools will be expanded, increasing the supply of high school places, optimizing school spatial structures, and improving teaching and living conditions. The plan also proposes building over 1,000 high-quality regular high schools, with a focus on areas with large permanent populations and population inflow. Priority will be given to improving conditions at county-level regular high schools, advancing standardization, and building a batch of comprehensive high schools and science high schools. The revitalization plan for county-level regular high schools will be deeply implemented, with a balanced allocation of teachers and overall improvement in school performance. Comprehensive high schools and science high schools will be well operated, along with a small number of high-quality secondary vocational schools, deepening the integration of vocational and general education to broaden student pathways.
The plan also addresses specific student groups. Children of rural migrant workers who have moved to cities will enjoy the same rights to compulsory education as children of local residents. The proportion of these children attending public schools will steadily increase, and conditions for taking the senior high school entrance exam in the inflow areas will be appropriately eased, with efforts to ensure eligible migrant children receive continuous basic education. The care system for children with disabilities, migrant children, left-behind children, and other vulnerable groups will be improved, and the regularized mechanism for dropout prevention will be strengthened. Special education will be advanced with the goal of high-quality integration, and the construction and standardized management of specialized schools will be enhanced. The building of resource centers for children with autism will be strengthened using existing resources, and large cities will be supported to establish special education schools for children with autism. Counties (cities, districts, banners) with a population of over 200,000 must build special education schools meeting standards, and special education will be included as a compulsory course for teacher education students.