This semester in our school’s English class, we read and discussed the Atlantic Monthly article ‘Confessions of a Prep School College Counselor,’ in which Caitlin Flanagan writes:
‘(I had no idea that) parents, who had always been lovely and appreciative when I was teaching their children, would become irritable and demanding once I was helping them all select a college. Granted, every year there were families who impressed me with their good cheer and resourcefulness in the face of the thorny admissions climate.
'But invariably a core group seemed to be teetering on the brink of emotional collapse. What I was observing, I later discovered, was a common phenomenon among the families of college-bound students of a certain social class, one aptly described by the psychologist Michael Thompson in a justly famous 1990 essay titled “College Admission as a Failed Rite of Passage.” College admissions, Thompson wrote, “can make normal people act nutty, and nutty people act quite crazy.” Bingo. I had inherited a Rolodex full of useful phone numbers (the College Board, a helpful counselor in the UCLA admissions office), but the number I kept handing out was that of a family therapist. “Maybe he could help you a bit,” I would say gently after yet another unexpectedly combustive family meeting.’
This article must have been on the back of my students’ mind when their parents flipped out in our semester-end parent-teachers meeting. Once they were handed their child’s first semester transcript, a few parents were shocked that their child’s grades were below average. One father was so angry that he screamed at his daughter until she started crying. Some parents blamed the teachers for the poor grades, and threatened to pull their child out of the programme. The teachers became frazzled, and the students, who were so full of life and energy in the classroom, adopted a distant and bored look in the face of their parents’ outbursts.
I tried to put a positive spin on all this. I told one parent that their son was confident and charismatic, athletic and musical – he had diverse talents and interests, and that’s probably why he lacked the focus and discipline necessary for tests. I praised another student as mature, thoughtful, and self-assured, and pointed out that the fact that she was a careless and sloppy writer now wouldn’t necessarily stop her from one day running a successful public relations firm.
The irony of all this is that both these students were happy and thriving. One was helping manage our daily newspaper, while the other was involved in a school play. But I somehow got the distinct impression that some parents would’ve been happier with their children being straight A drug-abusing kleptomaniacs.
What I didn’t tell the parents was that I suspected two students had a learning disability. They processed and interpreted information abnormally, and they couldn’t focus in class because they literally couldn’t conceive the term ‘focus.’ That means they’ll never do well on the SAT no matter how much they study for it, but it doesn’t mean they can’t be creative and have the drive to succeed non-conventionally. (Those with dyslexia are stymied in school, but in life they often excel as entrepreneurs and artists.)
Learning disabilities are perhaps an exaggerated phenomenon in the West, but in the test-taking culture that is China its existence isn’t even recognized. Each year thousands of creative and driven students are sorted out of Chinese schools because they aren’t good enough at math, a terrible loss to both society and to these families.
We can’t make students excel at math, but we can create an environment where students can excel in what they’re interested in. So it’s important to encourage parents to embrace their children’s distinctiveness, rather than demanding they conform to China’s rigid narrow and ultimately useless definition of intelligence.
But most parents – even those of high-achieving students – weren’t happy. The sharpness of logic can’t overcome the numbness of prejudice. I think it’s important for students to learn to read Atlantic Monthly articles, but many parents would rather their child cram for the SAT.
Caitlin Flanagan wrote that the American middle-class’s unexamined prejudices, anxieties, and insecurities fuel the college admissions frenzy. That’s even truer of Beijing’s middle-class. Having achieved their success more on guanxi and on luck than on ability and brains, Beijing’s middle class is determined to solidify their position with an American college degree for their child – no matter the financial costs to the family (and the resulting psychologist costs to their child).
Yes, it’s true that China’s recent economic emergence created untold wealth for those most ready to capture it: those who could back up their ambition with the proper guanxi and credentials. But as China becomes more of a competitive global market economy over the next decade, guanxi and an American college degree won’t be enough because there will be too many people with those assets – real-life skills and self-drive will matter even more.
But, of course, people tend to view the future through the lens of the past.
The inability to focus in class doesn’t have to be a bar to achievement. Pride and prejudice is far more disabling.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Monday, January 10, 2011
A Power to Transform China's Schools (OECD Insights Blog)
In this guest posting, Jiang Xueqin, director of Peking University High School’s International Division, looks at how pressure from students and parents is driving reform in Chinese education.
The year 2011 promises to be an exciting one for education reform in China. Last July, the government unveiled its 10-year education development plan, planning more spending and advocating greater experimentation. Education expenditure usually hovers around 3% of Gross Domestic Product, but Beijing aims to now spend 4%. That’s lower than the average 6.2% for developed nations, but it’s still a significant increase. Beijing also promises more local autonomy, which should encourage more competition and diversity.
Concrete action is already being taken. Last November, just after the national education plan was promulgated, I attended two high-level government meetings. In the first, Beijing’s top high schools were told to support and encourage students who wanted to study abroad. I saw that as a sign that China’s leaders recognized that Chinese universities were not producing the managerial and creative talent needed for a 21st century knowledge economy, and so decided that the best short-term solution was to send China’s brightest to the West’s best universities.
In the second meeting, Beijing’s best schools were told to create international divisions as laboratories for reform, and as portals to engage the world. We were told to attract Western experience and expertise in order to reform the public school curriculum, and to educate “globally competitive Chinese citizens.”
As another sign of how serious Beijing is about education reform, Central China TV’s 7 o’clock news programme, Beijing’s quasi-official mouthpiece, reported on our own high school’s reforms – led by Principal Wang Zheng – to promote freedom and choice, diversity and individuality: No longer do 50 students huddle together diffidently and indifferently, as their teacher lectures to them on multiple-choice test-taking strategies and “correct thinking.” Today, 20 students discuss and debate in groups, as a teacher hovers about, offering advice and encouragement. When the bell rings, students run to science lab or to band practice or to a well-lit study room to check their e-mail.
Still, there are reasons to wonder about how much is really changing on the ground.
For one thing, China has been exploring education reform since the early 1990s, and if anything the test-oriented system has only grown stronger and sturdier. For another, the national college entrance examination – or gaokao – is still widely seen as a hardworking farmboy’s best chance at a better life, even though many believe it stifles students’ creativity, social skills and desire to learn. Whenever Peking University even considers changing its admissions policies (such as adding a high school principal’s recommendation or an interview component to the gaokao score) there’s a national uproar.
Finally and most important, I question how much any high-level, top-down reform agenda can take root and effect change locally. In China, there’s a popular saying – “for each Beijing policy, the locals have countermeasures” – which means that despite Beijing’s exhaustive exhortations, Chinese have always done what they wanted. For now, for better or worse, cramming for one test as though it were a matter of life and death is what Chinese teachers, parents, and students want.
Nevertheless, I’m optimistic about the possibility of real reform, and it’s because in China there’s a new force that promises to bring experimentation and diversity, competition and accountability: the free market.
Prior to Beijing, I was in the free-wheeling southern boomtown of Shenzhen, where parents enrolled their children in the Shenzhen Middle School’s study-abroad programme. These parents were entrepreneurs frustrated with how the products of China’s education system lacked the initiative to work independently, and the social skills to work in a team. They chose our programme because they wanted their child to learn co-operation, creativity, and critical thinking skills, which they saw as hard currency in today’s global economy.
Today, there are now more Chinese students studying in America than from any other nation, and most of these students come from middle-class families who became so because of the market. It’s also the free market and the need for that extra competitive advantage that’s driving so many Chinese to study for a degree overseas.
For most of Chinese history, students only aspired to test into the mandarinate, but today students are seeing that they can turn their passion into their profession. The free market rewards successful musicians, athletes, and entrepreneurs more so than bureaucrats. That’s why I think in the near future elite music, sports, and trade schools will prove to be popular choices for China’s middle-class students.
The free market is questioning the value of a traditional Chinese education, and opening new vistas and possibilities for those who want out. I believe strongly that the gaokao system should be protected because it’s a vehicle for social mobility; but I also believe that Chinese schools need competition and diversity in order to provide a better education for all. Thanks to China’s economic development and the free market, real, lasting and concrete education reform is now within sight.
The year 2011 promises to be an exciting one for education reform in China. Last July, the government unveiled its 10-year education development plan, planning more spending and advocating greater experimentation. Education expenditure usually hovers around 3% of Gross Domestic Product, but Beijing aims to now spend 4%. That’s lower than the average 6.2% for developed nations, but it’s still a significant increase. Beijing also promises more local autonomy, which should encourage more competition and diversity.
Concrete action is already being taken. Last November, just after the national education plan was promulgated, I attended two high-level government meetings. In the first, Beijing’s top high schools were told to support and encourage students who wanted to study abroad. I saw that as a sign that China’s leaders recognized that Chinese universities were not producing the managerial and creative talent needed for a 21st century knowledge economy, and so decided that the best short-term solution was to send China’s brightest to the West’s best universities.
In the second meeting, Beijing’s best schools were told to create international divisions as laboratories for reform, and as portals to engage the world. We were told to attract Western experience and expertise in order to reform the public school curriculum, and to educate “globally competitive Chinese citizens.”
As another sign of how serious Beijing is about education reform, Central China TV’s 7 o’clock news programme, Beijing’s quasi-official mouthpiece, reported on our own high school’s reforms – led by Principal Wang Zheng – to promote freedom and choice, diversity and individuality: No longer do 50 students huddle together diffidently and indifferently, as their teacher lectures to them on multiple-choice test-taking strategies and “correct thinking.” Today, 20 students discuss and debate in groups, as a teacher hovers about, offering advice and encouragement. When the bell rings, students run to science lab or to band practice or to a well-lit study room to check their e-mail.
Still, there are reasons to wonder about how much is really changing on the ground.
For one thing, China has been exploring education reform since the early 1990s, and if anything the test-oriented system has only grown stronger and sturdier. For another, the national college entrance examination – or gaokao – is still widely seen as a hardworking farmboy’s best chance at a better life, even though many believe it stifles students’ creativity, social skills and desire to learn. Whenever Peking University even considers changing its admissions policies (such as adding a high school principal’s recommendation or an interview component to the gaokao score) there’s a national uproar.
Finally and most important, I question how much any high-level, top-down reform agenda can take root and effect change locally. In China, there’s a popular saying – “for each Beijing policy, the locals have countermeasures” – which means that despite Beijing’s exhaustive exhortations, Chinese have always done what they wanted. For now, for better or worse, cramming for one test as though it were a matter of life and death is what Chinese teachers, parents, and students want.
Nevertheless, I’m optimistic about the possibility of real reform, and it’s because in China there’s a new force that promises to bring experimentation and diversity, competition and accountability: the free market.
Prior to Beijing, I was in the free-wheeling southern boomtown of Shenzhen, where parents enrolled their children in the Shenzhen Middle School’s study-abroad programme. These parents were entrepreneurs frustrated with how the products of China’s education system lacked the initiative to work independently, and the social skills to work in a team. They chose our programme because they wanted their child to learn co-operation, creativity, and critical thinking skills, which they saw as hard currency in today’s global economy.
Today, there are now more Chinese students studying in America than from any other nation, and most of these students come from middle-class families who became so because of the market. It’s also the free market and the need for that extra competitive advantage that’s driving so many Chinese to study for a degree overseas.
For most of Chinese history, students only aspired to test into the mandarinate, but today students are seeing that they can turn their passion into their profession. The free market rewards successful musicians, athletes, and entrepreneurs more so than bureaucrats. That’s why I think in the near future elite music, sports, and trade schools will prove to be popular choices for China’s middle-class students.
The free market is questioning the value of a traditional Chinese education, and opening new vistas and possibilities for those who want out. I believe strongly that the gaokao system should be protected because it’s a vehicle for social mobility; but I also believe that Chinese schools need competition and diversity in order to provide a better education for all. Thanks to China’s economic development and the free market, real, lasting and concrete education reform is now within sight.
Monday, January 3, 2011
The Trouble with Parents (Diplomat)
Late last month, I finished my semester-long Peking High International Division English seminar by comparing and contrasting two articles from the Atlantic Monthly.
In The Organization Kid, David Brooks visits Princeton University, and reports on how baby boomers have engineered, assembled, and moulded their children for success without instilling in them ‘a vocabulary of virtue and vice’ to provide them with moral guidance and meaningful purpose. In The Apocalypse of Adolescence, Ron Powers examines how adolescents brutally and randomly murder, and blames this phenomenon on a materialistic society that’s indifferent to the spiritual confusion of young people.
I pointed out to my ten Chinese students that the two articles were two sides of the same coin – that the same parental and social emphasis on ‘the unfettered accumulation of wealth’ that can drive one kid to get into Princeton can also drive another to kill his mother.
In The Apocalypse of Adolescence, Powers focuses on Laird Stanard, a preppie who would be ‘The Organization Kid’ except that, angry his parents wouldn’t let him go to a party, he killed his loving, doting mother with a shotgun. At the surreal trial, a psychiatrist reportedly testified ‘in the most sombre, lugubrious voice you can imagine’ that Laird Standard had borderline personality disorder, but once outside the courtroom and freed from his ‘expert’ persona admitted he had no idea why Laird would kill his own mother.
While discussing Laird in class, I mentioned a student who had been expelled for stealing from her roommates. Her parents were fighting the expulsion, and two of the students were close to her, so there was a feeling of unease and tension at the mention of her.
So I also mentioned another, a 13-year-old student from Shenzhen who displayed all the classic symptoms of depression: he overslept, had personal hygiene issues, and couldn’t focus in class. Our teachers spent a semester wondering what was wrong with him, and it was only when I visited his parents that I discovered the answer.
His mother struck me as both over-protective and controlling: she decided things for the student and made excuses for his failings. It was her decision to send him abroad, something that I believed he resented.
When I returned to Beijing, I asked him if he would prefer to return to a traditional Chinese school. That sudden question shocked him into a rare smile, and it was then and there that I realized that Gary’s laziness and indifference were in fact a cry for help.
His mother came to Beijing, where I patiently explained to her that I thought she needed to respect her child as an independent human being with his own aspirations and ambitions. It seemed to have never occurred to her that her son had a right to control his own life, but when I explained to her the consequences of not respecting her own son – a growing, swelling, overwhelming sadness and anger with unpredictable consequences – she finally agreed to respect his desire to return to a traditional Chinese school. Maybe he was making a mistake, I told her, but it was his mistake to make.
My students, themselves under pressure to get into a top American university and loved and supported (if not trusted and respected by their parents), understood the boy’s situation. So wasn’t the girl’s blatant stealing also a cry for help?
Her parents had leveraged their wealth and guanxi to protect her from the consequences of her actions – her lying, her stealing, her bad grades – all the while ignoring her pleas for attention, which were her lying, her stealing, and her bad grades. The fact that her parents refused to admit that their child could lie and steal suggest that she may need to do something much worse to finally get her parents’ attention.
Different students react differently to over-protective, demanding parents. Those such as Brooks’ ‘The Organization Kid’ will become workaholics in the blind pursuit of success and run away from their unhappy, meaningless existences. Powers’ apocalyptic adolescents may end up killing their mothers – or hatch plots to blow up the world. But ‘The Organization Kid’ is the apocalyptic adolescent, and the two examples I’ve given are no different from many Chinese students, because every teenager seems the same: lost, confused, and alone all the while desperate for attention, praise, and love.
I believe it’s important to teach students how to cope with life, and that means teaching them independence and self-reliance, choice and responsibility. To that end, I’ve told parents that many students have bad grades, that these grades won’t be changed, and that a few students won’t graduate, let alone get into an US university.
American parents may see this as a wake-up call, but I’ve already been told by one Chinese parent that this approach is too ‘risky’. It’s challenging enough to prepare Chinese students for the world, but is it even possible to change their parents’ self-destructive behaviour?
I try because I see the reasons sitting in front of me every day in class. I try because I can see a student’s sudden smile when someone finally asks him what he wants. And I try because hopefully if parents are finally confronted with the consequences of a student’s lying and stealing, they’ll perhaps wonder what’s wrong not only with the student, but ultimately what might be wrong with their parenting.
In The Organization Kid, David Brooks visits Princeton University, and reports on how baby boomers have engineered, assembled, and moulded their children for success without instilling in them ‘a vocabulary of virtue and vice’ to provide them with moral guidance and meaningful purpose. In The Apocalypse of Adolescence, Ron Powers examines how adolescents brutally and randomly murder, and blames this phenomenon on a materialistic society that’s indifferent to the spiritual confusion of young people.
I pointed out to my ten Chinese students that the two articles were two sides of the same coin – that the same parental and social emphasis on ‘the unfettered accumulation of wealth’ that can drive one kid to get into Princeton can also drive another to kill his mother.
In The Apocalypse of Adolescence, Powers focuses on Laird Stanard, a preppie who would be ‘The Organization Kid’ except that, angry his parents wouldn’t let him go to a party, he killed his loving, doting mother with a shotgun. At the surreal trial, a psychiatrist reportedly testified ‘in the most sombre, lugubrious voice you can imagine’ that Laird Standard had borderline personality disorder, but once outside the courtroom and freed from his ‘expert’ persona admitted he had no idea why Laird would kill his own mother.
While discussing Laird in class, I mentioned a student who had been expelled for stealing from her roommates. Her parents were fighting the expulsion, and two of the students were close to her, so there was a feeling of unease and tension at the mention of her.
So I also mentioned another, a 13-year-old student from Shenzhen who displayed all the classic symptoms of depression: he overslept, had personal hygiene issues, and couldn’t focus in class. Our teachers spent a semester wondering what was wrong with him, and it was only when I visited his parents that I discovered the answer.
His mother struck me as both over-protective and controlling: she decided things for the student and made excuses for his failings. It was her decision to send him abroad, something that I believed he resented.
When I returned to Beijing, I asked him if he would prefer to return to a traditional Chinese school. That sudden question shocked him into a rare smile, and it was then and there that I realized that Gary’s laziness and indifference were in fact a cry for help.
His mother came to Beijing, where I patiently explained to her that I thought she needed to respect her child as an independent human being with his own aspirations and ambitions. It seemed to have never occurred to her that her son had a right to control his own life, but when I explained to her the consequences of not respecting her own son – a growing, swelling, overwhelming sadness and anger with unpredictable consequences – she finally agreed to respect his desire to return to a traditional Chinese school. Maybe he was making a mistake, I told her, but it was his mistake to make.
My students, themselves under pressure to get into a top American university and loved and supported (if not trusted and respected by their parents), understood the boy’s situation. So wasn’t the girl’s blatant stealing also a cry for help?
Her parents had leveraged their wealth and guanxi to protect her from the consequences of her actions – her lying, her stealing, her bad grades – all the while ignoring her pleas for attention, which were her lying, her stealing, and her bad grades. The fact that her parents refused to admit that their child could lie and steal suggest that she may need to do something much worse to finally get her parents’ attention.
Different students react differently to over-protective, demanding parents. Those such as Brooks’ ‘The Organization Kid’ will become workaholics in the blind pursuit of success and run away from their unhappy, meaningless existences. Powers’ apocalyptic adolescents may end up killing their mothers – or hatch plots to blow up the world. But ‘The Organization Kid’ is the apocalyptic adolescent, and the two examples I’ve given are no different from many Chinese students, because every teenager seems the same: lost, confused, and alone all the while desperate for attention, praise, and love.
I believe it’s important to teach students how to cope with life, and that means teaching them independence and self-reliance, choice and responsibility. To that end, I’ve told parents that many students have bad grades, that these grades won’t be changed, and that a few students won’t graduate, let alone get into an US university.
American parents may see this as a wake-up call, but I’ve already been told by one Chinese parent that this approach is too ‘risky’. It’s challenging enough to prepare Chinese students for the world, but is it even possible to change their parents’ self-destructive behaviour?
I try because I see the reasons sitting in front of me every day in class. I try because I can see a student’s sudden smile when someone finally asks him what he wants. And I try because hopefully if parents are finally confronted with the consequences of a student’s lying and stealing, they’ll perhaps wonder what’s wrong not only with the student, but ultimately what might be wrong with their parenting.
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