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Special Coverage:Education System in China

Date : 2019-12-02 Department : Office of International Cooperation (OIC)
【By Abby Hou(侯瑞涵)】
After 40 years of educational reform in China, the annual college acceptance rate exceeds 80%. While this figure suggests that China has achieved near-universal tertiary education, entrance to prestigious institutions is still fiercely competitive. As for Taiwan, 24 years of educational reform has produced a near 100% acceptance rate in higher education, suggesting an oversupply of tertiary education opportunities, and this rise in quantity should raise concerns about quality.

Madge Ma (馬婧雯) is an exchange student from Southwestern University of Finance and Economics in China. Talking about the education system in China, she mentioned Project 211, a new government initiative that seeks to enhance 112 institutions of higher education, with a particular focus on certain key areas. With China’s rapid economic development, the government is under pressure to ensure social and educational development keeps pace.

Project 211 aims to drive the educational development of high-level professional manpower. The students in the Project 211 institutions enjoy significant government tuition subsidies, which only cost them about 25,000 NTD for tuition per year. In Taiwan, the tuition is about 60,000 NTD per year, there we can see a huge difference. Despite this, China’s higher education system is characterized by inequitable distribution of education resources, with a particularly large funding gap between urban and exurban schools, which makes it even more difficult to get into Project 211 for those who have fewer resources in the country, thus stunting social mobility.

Furthermore, efforts to raise the average educational level in China are often slow due to the country’s huge population. Taiwan’s educational system is relatively more mature, but still features many areas in need of improvement. In particular, the oversupply of higher education ironically harms the international competitiveness of Taiwanese graduates.

Madge Ma (馬婧雯) states that she enjoys NCCU’s international atmosphere that embraces and respects diverse cultures. Students at NCCU should stay conscious of the advantages we have, seek to better understand global trends, and prepare to compete with the best graduates from around the world.
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