Throughout the “reform and opening” era, China has struggled to universalise primary education and, as it nears that goal, the government is raising expenditure to remove financial barriers for the poorest families. But, as Chang Tianle (常天乐) reports, remaining challenges are not all financial.
For the first time, sixteen-year-old school student, Wang Weiyi (王伟懿), from Yulin, in northern Shaanxi Province, did not have to worry about money before the semester started. His father has been seriously sick for years and is unable to work. His mother thus takes sole responsibility for tending the fields and feeding the family. School fees, accommodation and food for the couple’s two children amount to about CNY 1,600 (USD 200) a year—equivalent to the annual per capita income of farmers in Yulin County.
Wang and his sister have been relying on a government subsidy to continue their studies. Before 2006, the government only covered part of the school fees for poor students and Wang could not secure funding every time. School accommodation and living costs were also a big problem for him, so he and his family had to seek other sources of funding such as personal donations. But this year, he was told that government would pay all education and living costs for him. “It is a great relief to my family,” he says.
He is one of millions of rural children to benefit from the central government’s “two frees, one subsidy” (liang mian yi bu, 两免一补) policy of waiving fees and providing boarding allowances for poor students during their nine years of compulsory education. Each beneficiary receives CNY 210-320 a year, making school fees and textbooks virtually free. Some impoverished students in boarding schools will also get living allowances.
When the policy was first introduced in 1998, it was only implemented in a small number of counties on a trial basis, with an annual budget of CNY 30 million. In 2001, the policy was formally launched in more areas and the budget increased to CNY 100 million.
In 2005, the national and provincial governments in central and western China injected CNY 7.2 billion to the programme. Over 34 million rural students received free textbooks and 32 million had school fees waived. Six million received a living allowance. As a result, 350,000 students who were unable to go to school in central and western China went back to the campus last year.
NGOs in Yunan, Xinjiang, Jiangsu, Shaanxi, contacted by China Development Brief, all say that the subsidies appear to be getting though, and that they have seen the changes the policy is bringing to local communities. Kou Weiwei (寇薇薇), Programme Officer of Nanjing-based Amity Foundation （爱德基金会）, which works in 16 provinces, says the policy is being well-implemented in successive phases.
Starting from 2006, the state is covering school and textbook fees for all rural students in 13 western provinces. Next year, the policy will be extended to all provinces. The goal is for compulsory education to be free of charge to all rural students by then. Poor students in rural boarding schools will also be provided with living allowances.
According to Yuan Liansheng (袁连生), an education and economics professor at Beijing Normal University, although China’s education in general is better than countries with similar economic situations, such as India, it is largely reliant on financing by families, instead of the government.
“Rural education has long been neglected by the government,” he says. Indeed, China’s education expenditure accounts for less than 3% of its skyrocketing GDP, lower than world’s average 5%. Only a small portion of the education budget goes to rural education.
This leads to a heavy financial burden on families. “The proportion of education costs in Chinese family expenditure is much higher than international levels. The situation is even worse in impoverished rural families,” says Yuan.
In the past, most of the expenditure in rural schools came from students, who pay fees of around CNY 100 each semester.
Guta Middle School in northern Shaanxi Province, like other schools in the county, used to charge each student CNY 131.5 a semester to run the school. “Virtually, it’s the students and their families who support the school’s day-to-day operation,” says Zhang Tiancheng (张天成), director of this 900-student school.
The combined cost of books and living expenses has in the past caused some of his students to drop out of school before completing nine years of compulsory education. “Some of the poorest farmers can’t even afford rice and flour, how can they afford education for their children?” says Zhang.
In the past, the government and school had a small budget to sponsor impoverished children, but it was far from enough to keep everyone stay. In 2000, nearly 11 million children aged 7—16 were out of school, according to Professor Yuan.
Now this expenditure is covered by the government, as the “two frees, one subsidy” policy has been fully implemented in Zhang’s county this year. Some fully subsidised students only need pay CNY 30 each year to enjoy full access to school, including books, food and accommodation.
School fee subsidies and living allowance are part of government’s efforts to improve rural education. Other key areas include classroom construction, teacher salary and paying off school’s debt.
The government has promised to increase its budget on rural compulsory education in 11th Five Year Plan (2006-2010) by CNY 218.2 billion, 57% of which is to come from central government with local governments take care of the remaining 43%.
By giving financial support to rural students, government policy is to increase the enrolment in compulsory education to 98% by 2010 from a reported 93.6% in 2004.
China is also revising its Law of Compulsory Education to enhance the government’s obligation in compulsory education.
“The government acknowledges social conflicts in rural China and the disadvantaged situation of farmers. It is critical to solve the problems now before it is too late. Education is certainly an important part of the solution,” says Yuan.
Lack of funding has been a grave challenge for China’s rural education for decades. Now, as the government budget increases, people are starting to see the light at the end of tunnel.
Salary arrears were once common for rural teachers, with pay checks sometimes arriving months late. “Now we always get paid on time. The salary defaulted in 1993 and 1998 was also paid recently,” Guta Middle School’s Zhang says.
Now Zhang and his colleagues receive CNY 600-1100 a month, still lower than other jobs for educated people in neighbouring towns, but enough to maintain a stable team of teachers.
According to Zhang Yao (张尧)，a PhD student at Columbia University’s Teachers School, rural schools used to face a huge challenge of losing quality teachers as the salary was not satisfactory. “But recently we have seen more young graduates from teacher’s college willing to take jobs in rural schools,” she says.
But Yuan is more concerned about the quality of education, particularly in remote areas. The current policy only covers rural school’s daily operation expenditure. But more money is needed to improve their libraries, laboratories and computer rooms, and also to invest in improved teacher training and teaching methods. “This is one of the areas that NGOs can play a significant role,” he adds.
NGOs and government-backed charitable organisations have indeed engaged actively in supporting rural education. China encourages public donations to bridge the gap between rural education expenditure and treasury budgets.
In 1989, the China Youth Development Foundation (中国青少年发展基金会), backed by China Youth League, launched “Project Hope” (希望工程) to finance rural schools and students. In the past 17 years, it has raised CNY 3 billion, sponsored nearly 3 million students and built 12,559 schools.
Given the government’s financial injection into rural education, the Foundation has decided to stop providing allowances to cover fees for primary and middle school students. Instead, it will create a scholarship programme to support top students from poor households. Moreover, Project Hope will switch its focus from the first nine years of schooling to high schools, universities and migrant children. This year, it launched a program to sponsor vocational education.
Erkenjiang Tulahong (尔肯江•吐拉洪), Council Chair of the Foundation told a conference in June that even after compulsory education is made free to rural students, other expense are still challenging to them. “Project Hope is still needed, and critical to the national rural education, given the fact that we still have 50 million people living in poverty,” he said.
Other NGOs are also seeking changes to cope with the new situation.
The Amity Foundation launched a “Back to Campus” programme in 1994. It has sponsored more than 100,000 impoverished students to finish primary school. With the change in government policies, the foundation is now considering changing its approach in the next two years.
Plan China, a child-centred international development organisation, is working in five nationally designated poor counties in Shaanxi Province. Over the past eleven years it has invested heavily to improve education through teacher training, curriculum development, infrastructure construction, school management, and child sponsorship programmes. It also offers financial aid to students who cannot afford to attend school. But since last July, when the government started to cover school and book fees for all rural students in Shaanxi, Plan China has stopped providing financial support for this, re-allocating funds to subsidise the living allowance for students at boarding schools.
In the past few years, many village schools have been closed and students have to go to nearby villages or towns to attend so-called “central schools” (中心校).
Many of the students have to board in the school and go home once a week. “This gives their families an extra burden as the living cost rises,” says Sun Lei (孙磊)，Programme Manager of Plan China. Now Plan China implements various projects, such as nutrition plan and kitchen renovation, to improve children’s living conditions in boarding schools,
Guta Middle School is one of Plan China’s partners. Plan has helped the school to construct classrooms, labs and playgrounds. With funding and instruction from Plan, the school has also improved its campus environment and built a drinking water system. Plan also introduces a child-centred education approach into the school.
“Most of the government education fund goes to the cities, rural schools like us are more or less neglected. We are lucky to have Plan China to help us,” says Guta Middle School Director, Zhang. Indeed, thanks to Plan’s support, he says, the school has begun to attract students from neighbouring townships.
Moving forward, Sun says, Plan China will continue to improve rural school’s education environment, facilities and provide teacher’s training.
Yuan points out that government’s focus on compulsory education is only a starting point of a long journey, adding that impoverished high school students, rural high schools, teacher training and migrant children are all areas that require more attention from the government. “This also gives NGOs a lot of work to do,” he says.
Wang Weiyi doesn’t want to be like his 18-year-old sister, who goes to work at a construction site after she finishes nine-year compulsory education. His test scores are not bad and he has good chance of getting a high school place next year. But high school places are not covered by the new subsidies, leaving him worried again about funding. “It will be a lot of money, I have no idea how to make it,” he sighs.
October 9, 2006