Adam Sichta

Challenges of Reform: Ending the Dominance of the Gaokao (??), Beginning the Future of Chinese Education Adam Sichta

The National College Entrance Examination (NCEE) dictates how almost every facet of China?s educational system is administered. As early as primary school, students are forced to become locked in intense competition, battle hordes of examinations, cope with insufferable pressure, and abandon childhood. Inequity between urban and rural education is spiraling out of control. Cries for change to a more ?quality education? that will relieve the students? burden are in the air, but they are being met with fierce resistance by those who claim NCEE meritocracy provides their only hope. Many people are cognizant of the serious problems facing China?s educational system, but very few seem able to describe how they can be resolved. This paper will set-up and bring-down the most difficult and unsolvable problems of Chinese education. New and original ideas are going to be injected to replace the shortsighted and misguided suggestions currently proffered, and these ideas will explain exactly how China can create an educational system that will benefit all students equally.