(Very Basic) Ruminations on (Very Simple) Political and Educational Philosophy

Yesterday we visited Beihang University High School. This school is affiliated with Beihang University, one of the top science and technology universities in China. Because of this affiliation, the high school has a strong STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) focus.

I've been thinking a lot about something I noticed as I watched a promotional video the high school showed us. The video was a montage of images of students engaged in various academic activities. What I was thinking about about was that there were very, very few images of students working in groups or collaborating. I know that if a similar video were made at my school, we would want most of the images to show students up out of their seats working together. This is not to say that Beihang High School was not doing amazing things with their students...they were for sure, but it was an observation I made.

So, here's where the politics come in. I would grossly simplify China's and the US's political systems this way: In China, the State comes before the individual, while in America, the individual comes before the State.

Both systems have positive qualities as well as drawbacks. I know I'm lucky to live in the country that allows its citizens the freedom to have open debate about the tension and appropriate line between government intervention and individual freedom, but that is an altogether different tangent than the one I wanted to take you on in this post...back to the point:

The curious thing I've noticed is that it seems like each of our country's education systems are opposite of the overriding State philosophy. In other words, the Chinese education system is hyper-competitive and focused on individual achievement. Parents will do everything they can for their child to get ahead and score well on the high school exam because a child's score and subsequent education in university is what determines her entire family's socioeconomic future. The onus is on the student and her family to have success in school. On the other hand, much of U.S. educational philosophy has students working collaboratively in groups to solve problems together. At my school it sometimes feels like we bend over backward to not let a child fail, and if she still does, the onus is on the teacher and the school rather than the student and the family. I still think our system works better, but again, there are things that work and don't work in both systems.

So, to wrap up, I'll just say that it's interesting that politically, China puts the group in front of the individual, but in school it is the individual ahead of the group. In the United States, the ideas are reversed.

While I'm dipping my toes into the political swimming pool, I'll leave you with two quotes I've written down from two of our presenters. Make of them what you will:

From Dr. Richard Belsky, Professor of History at Hunter College: The US is a, "late-period empire getting lazy."

and...

From Professor Han Liyan of Beihang University: The Centralized Chinese government is able to "do something very thoroughly, very fast."