What’s changing in the China’s education system? What might change in the future? Those are some of the questions that Thomas Hatch asked Yong Zhao about in preparation for a visit to China last month. Zhao was born in China and now works all over the world, including in China, exploring the implications of globalization and technology on education. In part two of this interview, Zhao offers his impressions of recent changes in addressing students’ mental health and discusses the broader context of the Chinese education system and some of the challenges and opportunities for changes in the future. In the first part of the interview, Zhao shared his observations about some of the educational innovations he’s seen, and he’s been involved in China.
Thomas Hatch (TH): In the first part of our conversation, you shared a number of examples some new schools and educational developments in China. In other places like Finland, the US, and even in places like Vietnam and Singapore, I’ve also seen more attention to students’ mental health. Have you seen any initiatives related to supporting students’ healthy development or mental health and well-being in China?
Yong Zhao (YZ): I think that is happening because they’re adding more psychiatrists, more psychologists or “psychological teachers” to schools. Those never existed in China until recent years. So that’s a beginning. But also, traditionally, teachers of Chinese have had a responsibility for psychological support, though they may not have specific training for it. But the approach in Chinese culture is also different from the western way of constructing psychological and mental well-being. In the West, I think we sometimes misunderstand psychological issues because we just describe them, we measure them, we test them. And we have a handbook that defines what’s considered mental health. I’m quite worried about this. Is this a good thing to do?
It’s similar with what’s considered special education in China. Asian countries definitely have a very different definition. There the term applies primarily to those who have a major disability. But now the Western movement of attending to ADHD and learning differences is slowly spreading, though they are not being addressed in schools.
TH: When you say you think that the approach to psychological well-being and health is different in China, how would you describe it?
YZ: First, I’m not a researcher in that area, so I cannot describe it, but I’m very worried about the Western definition going into China and getting applied in that cultural context. I’ve always worried about what is China and what is the Western way of doing things? I’m struggling with this.
But one thing I want to emphasize is people always think I’m critical of China, but I’ve said, “I’m critical of everybody.” This is very important. I don’t think anyone has got it right. If someone had it right, we could retire. And some people say, “you’re pro- America.” And the truth is, I’m more critical of American education than other places. I think there is an interesting question about whether the Western way is the right way of doing this. when you think about well-being, I’m not sure because when you look you can see there is widespread misuse of special education, misuse of mental health issues, and I think there are a lot of problems that arise with psychiatrists and psychoanalysts. Many things are happening
“I’m critical of everybody. This is very important. I don’t think anyone has got it right. If someone had it right, we could retire.“
TH: One of my goals is to understand what’s changing within a Chinese context and to think about the cultural, economic, and geographical conditions or “affordances” and what they can tell us about the possibilities of educational change. Can you give us your sense of the Chinese conception of development overall and the purposes and aims that underlie Chinese education?
YZ: Right now, I think China is quite misunderstood. People are easily influenced by media stories. You and I started this conversation talking about how schools don’t change, but like Larry Cuban has said, changes are like a breath on the window in the wintertime. You breathe on the window, and something happens, but then you’re gone, and it’s gone. We need to keep that in mind. Schools do not change, but they’re always changing. This is what I love about it. It’s happening all the time. Every week, for example, I receive emails from someone who is discussing innovation somewhere. Innovation is still there. But how come most schools don’t change? But schools actually do change because they do little things. When you refer back to the grammar of schooling, the grammar in schools hasn’t changed in a long time. But at the same time, there are activities that are changing. So, we need to consider how big a change is a change. That’s another thing to think about.
“Schools don’t change, but they’re always changing. This is what I love about it. It’s happening all the time. Every week, for example, I receive emails from someone who is discussing innovation somewhere. Innovation is still there. But how come massive schools don’t change?“
We also have to think about the diversity of the student population and who is benefiting from doing what. That’s another thing we normally don’t talk about. We talk about education innovation for all students, but not necessarily everybody benefits from the same allocation of time. I’ve not written this yet, but I’m working on this now. Another reason education doesn’t change is that whenever you change a school, you change the entire school, but the needs of the local community are always diverse. Whatever you change it into becomes a monopoly, so you never meet everyone’s needs. What I’m trying to do is to say schools should build many schools within a school, so you actually have diversity, allowing certain schools to grow within your school to meet the needs of the community. That’s my recent theory; trying to go in that direction.
TH: Your comments about change and the grammar of schooling are fascinating because the “grammar” hasn’t changed, but only if you look back within the modern, industrial era. Because if you think back beyond 100 or 120 years — if you go back far enough – some key aspects of schooling have definitely changed. So, it’s a question of perspective. If today, instead of trying to produce changes that we’re going to see tomorrow, we’re actually looking ahead to 40 or 50 years, we might be much more successful if we can be strategic in terms of enabling schools to shift over the long-term. As you look ahead and think about what could or what might happen in terms of Chinese education, do you see ways that it is changing or that it could change in the future?
YZ: What is going to happen in China? First of all, in any foreseeable future, China will not drop the Gaokao, the national exam to select students for university. The Chinese people value college credentials very much. I used to joke about how much Chinese love credentials. Even if they don’t know how to drive, they want to buy a driver’s license, they just want that damn thing. So that will not change. But the Chinese government has been trying very hard to adjust the numbers of students going to high schools and universities and to vocational high schools. Now, at the end of 9th grade, the students are divided into two groups by the Gaokao. It’s like the German system used to be. The highest scorers on the test go to the general high school and then they go to college. Another group goes to the vocational, technical high school, and then you go to the workforce. There’s a lot of problems with that, and right now they’ve changed the quotas so that more students are supposed to be sent to vocational schools. So, they’re trying to adjust that.
But my view is this. I think I wrote in my book “Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Dragon” that in China, the big problem is that no matter what you do, people will think there is always one best college – for example, Tsinghua or Peking University – and you can only take in so many kids no matter what you do. So, no matter how you change the exam, there are only so many kids who can go in. That is a huge problem. So, the Gaokao will dominate for a long time, and you will have a lot of kids dropping out of the education system before 9th grade if they’re not getting on the path to the best universities. It’s just that, basically, there’s no point to stay in the system. So, that’s not going to change.
Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Dragon, Book Cover
What is going to change? Is after school, weekends. I also think that because of the access to technology and the quick spread of AI, you will have a group of students who, in a sense, are already pre-selected to get into general high schools and to prepare for the colleges. But you will also have a lot of students who have decided “I’m not going to college. I can’t go to college.” Those places with those students might see some changes, and those schools that have those students are not visited and are not understood by people. You know, if you go to a county level, they have high schools, and those high schools don’t have the best students because the best students have been sent to the provincial capital. I don’t think people understand the experiences of those kids who aren’t going to college, what their life is, and you might see some significant changes in those places.
“If you go to a county level, they have high schools, and those high schools don’t have the best students because the best students have been sent to the provincial capital. I don’t think people understand the experiences of those kids who aren’t going to college, what their life is, and you might see some significant changes in those places.”
TH: That’s fascinating, and it connects with Clayton Christensen’s notion that disruptive innovation emerges when there are people who are unserved, and I think you’re identifying in China that there are students who in a sense are not served by their schools or colleges. It could be fascinating to see what might develop there, particularly given the development of technologies and the spread of internet and AI.
YZ: There’s another thing that will affect China a lot, and that’s the drop-in birth rate. Right now, China is graduating over 11,000,000 college students, but the birth rate last year in China was closer to 9 million. As a result, a lot of elementary schools and kindergartens are closing because they don’t have enough students. But now there are groups of private colleges, smaller colleges, and they’re actually trying very hard to get kids in because that’s how they make money. Imagine what would happen if you opened all those places and take in every kid into college?
Dr. Yong Zhao is a Foundation Distinguished Professor in the School of Education at the University of Kansas and a professor in Educational Leadership at the Faculty of Education, University of Melbourne in Australia. He previously served as the Presidential Chair, Associate Dean, and Director of the Institute for Global and Online Education in the College of Education, University of Oregon, where he was also a Professor in the Department of Educational Measurement, Policy, and Leadership. Prior to Oregon, Yong Zhao was University Distinguished Professor at the College of Education, Michigan State University, where he also served as the founding director of the Center for Teaching and Technology, executive director of the Confucius Institute, as well as the US-China Center for Research on Educational Excellence. He is an elected member of the National Academy of Education and a fellow of the International Academy of Education.
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