Educational Reform in Modern China

In the 1910s, China actively introduced various educational models, primarily from Japan, France and Germany. Educational reform took on greater urgency at the time of the May 4th Movement--reforming the Chinese culture and enlightening Chinese minds needed a good educational system. This reform was assisted with the return of several students from the U.S., at least some of whom had been sponsored Boxer Indemnity Fund. Several of them, including Hu Shi, later professor of philosophy at National Peking University, a preeminent university in China in the 20th century, and Chiang Menglin, professor of education and later vice chancellor at National Peking University in the 1920s, had studied at the Teachers' College at Columbia University, and, when their adviser John Dewey visited Japan in early 1919, they invited Dewey to visit China afterwards, an invitation that Dewey accepted, with a trip in China for over one year where Dewey gave over 100 lectures and visited dozens of cities, spreading the American educational reform then underway. Another Columbia University education professor, Paul Monroe, visited China in the 1920s and served on the board of directors for China Foundation for the Promotion of Education and Culture. American educational influence gained the strongest momentum in China in the 1920s. Compared with the educational systems China borrowed in the 1910s, the American system emphasized the development of individuality. Introducing the American system facilitated the anti-tradition movement underway in China in the late 1910s-1920s, when Confucian learning was swept under the rug, and the Confucian system of thinking--emphasizing the family and the hierarchical order of different family members, was considered a hindrance to China's modernity. The emphasis on individuality seemed to help bring about Chinese youth who would be more forward and outward looking rather than focused on the burdens of their traditions and customs. John Dewey, one of the forerunners of educational reform in 20th century America, emphasized an integration of education and life, which catered to the Chinese call for a practical approach to learning instead of the old emphasis on the classics that were far removed from practical life. Dewey's concern, of how to maintain individuality in a growingly corporate America and the viability of democracy coincided with the goals of the Society for the Promotion of New Education that called for the development of individuality and emphasis on practical learning. The Society for the Promotion of New Education, formed of five societies and institutions in 1919, was another testimony that spontaneous organizations were sprouting up in China after the founding of the republic. Its key publication, Hsin Chiao-yu (New Education), became another mass media propagating new educational ideas to promote democratic citizenship in China. One of the attractions of the American educational system was its emphasis on practical life. Dewey had a slogan: education is life. Chiang Menglin, editor of the New Education magazine, was hoping the organization would improve popular literacy in China. Both Chiang and Hu Shi were hoping to bring about a new Chinese society without involving the corrupt and undependable Beijing government. On this point they differed from young university students who, continuing a tradition of scholarly remonstrance to the emperors  in history, were marching into the streets, taking political action, spreading leaflets, talking as if they were going to run the government. The political chaos and instability in China caused Chancellor Cai Yuanpei to resign twice in four years, and vice Chancellor Chiang Menglin great difficulty in implementing his popularizing education program. Even university professors had difficulty making ends meet. for several years in the 1920s the government issued IOUs to them for months on  end. Many university professors to make ends meet had to teach at three or four different universities at the same time. Survival became the most pressing issue. Popularizing education through the expansion of schools or night schools became almost impossible. Educators started to look for greater social change in order to ameliorate the educational problems. After 1925, growing nationalism made learning from the U.S. educational system more untenable. On May 30 1925, because of a clash between British factory owners and Chinese textile workers in Shanghai that ended in the subsequent deaths of a dozen workers, Chinese workers all over the country marched out in demonstration against the presence of imperialism in China. The May 30 Movement marked the beginning of a new height of Chinese nationalism that would turn the Chinese gradually away from American educational models. The deterioration of Chinese society that followed in the 1930s turned Chinese more inward for a solution, and more toward theories that offered an explanation of social stagnation and solution to it. Marxism came in as a helpful explanation in the latter regard. American educational influence remained in the form of continued student return from the U.S. who played a key role in Chinese education and other areas of life, and the Boxer Indemnity fund support of many educational and cultural projects through the China Foundation.