Whatever happened to China's much publicized educational prowess?

The Surprising Truth About Education in China?

Chinese President Xi Jinping has laid out a “bold vision” for transforming his country’s economy by 2050. But one of the biggest hurdles to realizing that vision could come from an unexpected source, writes Christopher Balding for Bloomberg View: the education system.

“A widely held view in the West is that China's schools are brimming with math and science whizzes, just the kind of students that companies of the future will need. But this is misleading: For years, headline-grabbing studies showing China's prowess on standardized  tests evaluated only kids in rich and unrepresentative areas. When its broader population was included, China's ranking dropped across all subject areas,” Balding writes.

“Official data bears out this dynamic. According to the 2010 census, less than 9 percent of Chinese had attended school beyond the secondary level. More than 65 percent had gone no further than junior high. From 2008 to 2016, China's total number of graduate students actually decreased by 1 percent. Outside the richest areas, much of China's population lacks even the basic skills required in a high-income economy.”

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