The Achievements of Vocational Education in China

1. The Rapid Expansion of the Scale of Vocational Education

During the l5 years between 1980 and 1995, the proportion of regular senior high school students among all the students in senior secondary education has decreased from 81£¥ to 44£¥, while the proportion of secondary vocational school students has increased from 19£¥ to 56£¥. From l980 to l997, secondary vocational education institutions produced 30£®85 million graduates, fostering millions of secondary-level and primary-level technical workers, managers, skill workers and other labors with good vocational and technical education.

2. The Big Stride Made in the Construction of Vocational Education Teachers

Teachers for vocational education are mostly graduates from regular higher education institutions. Since 1989, over 160 HEIs have established departments, specialities or classes devoted to the training of vocational education teachers with the total enrollment of 21,000 students. At the same time, the government began the establishment of teacher training bases for vocational education, Nowadays, there are 14 training bases set by vocational technical colleges which are affiliated to HEIs and over 200 bases set by central departments and local governments. As a result, a training bases network has basically taken shape, meeting the needs of teacher training for vocational education of various forms and at various levels.

3. The Increase of the Quality and Level of Vocational Education

During the past 50 years, especially the 20 years after reform and opening to the outside world, much attention has been paid to the quality and level of vocation education as well as the schooling efficiency. Meanwhile its scale has been extraordinary expanded. By the end of 1998, more than 2000 key and pilot vocational schools have been established, promoting the overall development of vocational education.

4. The Primary Fruits of the Teaching Reform of Vocational Education

Learning the foreign modern vocational education thought and teaching patterns to improve the level of teaching is an important component of the reform of vocational education, For example, the "dual-track system " of Germany, the educational and training pattern based on the ability in Australia and Canada, the Employment Education Structure £¨ MES £© advocated by the World Labor Organization, the " Skill Courses for Starting Small Enterprises" initiated by the UNECO and the " Business and Trade Simulated Company" springing up widely all over the world, all became the models for the reform of Chinese vocational education. At present, related to the industries like mechanics, chemistry industry, electric power, architecture, agriculture, railroad transportation, oil industry, public health, business and light industry, hundreds of vocational schools in Qingdao, Suzhou, Wuxi, Changzhou, Wuhu, Shenyang and Jingsha and a large number of enterprises are carrying out the pilot reform of vocational education based on foreign teaching patterns to improve the teaching level of vocation education in China.

5. Rapid Development of Vocational Education in Rural Areas

Since the 1980's, significant progress has been made in vocational education in rural areas of China with its quantity greatly enlarged and quality greatly Research on Vocational Education With the development of vocational education, research on vocational education has been enhanced and a number of vocational education research institutions have been established, organizing the full-time and part-time research teams composed jointly by administrative departments responsible for vocational education, research institutions, vocational schools and academic organizations, carrying out various forms of vocational education research at different levels. Since the 1960's, about 76 research topics have been included in the state education research plans with some of the research fruits playing an important role of reference for the government to make vocational education policies.