Abstract
Since the world learned about the stellar performance of Shanghai’s secondary students in recent international assessments (in PISA 2009 and PISA 2012), speculations abound as to how the Chinese students could have collectively demonstrated such extraordinary academic ability in the international aptitude tests. In the PISA tests that involved sixty-five countries and territories around the world, the students of Shanghai set themselves apart as the outlier of high achievers whose performance in reading, mathematics and science tests was far above world norms.
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Notes
- 1.
PISA is the abbreviation for the Program for International Student Achievement operated by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). A standardized test, which aimed to assess the competencies of fifteen-year-old students in reading, mathematics and science, PISA has been administered every three years in dozens of countries around the world. The test is a paper-based test that lasted for 2 hours. In PISA 2009 and PISA 2012, sixty-five countries and territories participated with about half-a-million students taking the test. Shanghai participated in this worldwide assessment program for the first time in 2009.
- 2.
The social status of teachers is a case in point. In a survey conducted by a British organization on teacher status that involved twenty-one countries, it is found that nearly 50% of the 1000 Chinese parents surveyed would encourage their children to become teachers (Dolton and Marcenaro-Gutierrez 2013: 17), even though the average teacher salary in the second lowest among the sampled countries. In China, where teacher status is ranked first among such countries as Germany, Japan, Korea, and the U.S., survey respondents reportedly think of teachers being most closely compared to medical doctors (Ibid.: 19). In another survey on Chinese teachers which attracted over nine thousand respondents, close to 40% newly recruited teachers have deemed the status of their occupational status close to that of medical doctors and lawyers; but very few of them actually attributed their choice of teaching as an occupation to the high social status of teachers. Rather, “stable employment situation” afforded by the teaching profession was one of the major reasons for them to become teachers (Wenhui Daily 2014). The findings of these surveys point to the relatively high social status of teachers in China. Paradoxically, few high achieving university graduates have aspired to become teachers. The continuous calls for “talented people” to join the teaching profession demonstrate that they are in short supply in China’s schools. Many observers have attributed this shortage to the meager salaries of teachers. Others think that the mundanity of teaching cannot attract those with career ambitions.
- 3.
For over five hundred years (770–221 BC) before the Qin dynasty, China, under the nominal rule of the Zhou dynasty, was divided into feudal states that contested for hegemony. Proponents of different schools of thought, armed with proposals that ran the gamut from statecraft to astrology, actively vied for the patronage of powerful rulers. The contest for attention was intense, fueling a lively atmosphere of intellectual debates. Those thinkers and strategists who were able to convinced the rulers of their worth were rewarded with official appointments. Ambitious rulers also sought their advice earnestly. At its height, open forums of debates among leading thinkers were sponsored by the rulers. The Jixia xuegong (Jixia Imperial Academy), for example, was established by the King of Qi during the later part of the third century BC to attract the participation of “virtuous” scholars. These scholars were philosophers and men of letters who constituted China’s earliest counterpart of the sophists. The Academy was considered by some as the first school for higher learning in the history of China. Noteworthy scholars, including such Confucian luminaries as Mencius and Xun Zi, were inducted as its scholar-officials. They were deferentially referred to as the “gentlemen of Jixia”. The service of prominent scholars was generously compensated. Their duties were mainly academic, thus freeing them from the burden of administration. At its height, the Academy reportedly boosted a congregation of over a thousand “gentlemen of Jixia”. Not all of them were equal in their prominence, however, as the reputation and generosity of the Academy had attracted persons of different persuasions and abilities, including those who traveled between kingdoms peddling their ideas and strategies.
- 4.
The Confucian school of thought was shunned by the rulers of the short-lived Qin Dynasty who opted to implement draconian laws that were framed by their Legalist advisors. The Han Dynasty succeeded the Qin Dynasty and ruled China during 202 BC to 220 AD. It was considered one of the most powerful dynasties in Chinese history when great progress was made in military, political and cultural affairs. The institutionalization of Confucianism was initiated in 136 BC under the reign of the Han emperor Wu Di at the urging of a prominent scholar Dong Zhongshu (179–104 BC). An ambitious emperor, Wu Di openly sought for a grand design that could realize his aspirations for China. Dong’s advice was to establish Confucianism as the state ideology at the exclusion of other schools of thought. The emperor was urged to govern with virtue and to implement a developmental strategy that stressed the divine basis of imperial legitimacy, the imperatives of a unified empire, and the establishment of a normative and regulative structure that could support the growth of his empire.
- 5.
It should be noted that not all officials were Confucian scholars. There were periods in Chinese history when Confucianism was replaced by other schools of thought and religions, such as metaphysical philosophy, Daoism and Buddhism. Defined by the dynasties and in accordance with the ideological choices of their emperors, these periods marked gaps in the long chronology of Confucianism as state ideology. The gaps notwithstanding, the advocacy of Confucianism for a highly structured society has found ready subscribers in many imperial rulers through the dynasties.
- 6.
Widely known as one of the most powerful emperor in Chinese history, Li Shimin (posthumous title Tang Taizong, 598–649 AD) who brought the Tang Dynasty to a new height of imperial power and glory, had placed great importance on the examination system as a selection and recruitment mechanism of the officialdom.
- 7.
There is no definitive study on the origin of these instructors. Scholars have speculated that they first made their appearance as shamans who conducted ceremonies for rain, and then as instructors of ritualistic dance that was a required skill for princes and young noblemen. Through their presence in the imperial court, they were able to establish continual contacts with the throne. Some of them became tutors in the imperial households. See, for example, Yan (1994).
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Lo, L.N.K., Ye, J. (2017). The Historical Context of the Role and Status of Scholars and Teachers in Traditional China. In: Zhu, X., Goodwin, A., Zhang, H. (eds) Quality of Teacher Education and Learning. New Frontiers of Educational Research. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-3549-4_10
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