Focus
New incentive policies to encourage doctoral degrees
By Ou Lu (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-03-23 10:43
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Although many Chinese students are turning their backs on private colleges because of allegedly substandard programs and lax regulation, China's education authorities say they hope the country's private colleges will start offering doctorate degree programs soon.
"China's private education sector will play a decisive role in determining the success of our education reform," Sun Xiaobing, director of the policy and regulation department of the Ministry of Education, said at a recent seminar.
According to the reform plan the country's education authorities will create incentive policies to encourage qualified private colleges in China to start graduate and doctorate degree programs.
The number of private universities has grown rapidly in Beijing in recent years, as publicly financed institutions have been unable to meet rising demand for higher education.
Around 13 percent of students who enrolled in tertiary education in Beijing in 2007 did so in private institutions, according the Annual Report on Social Development of Beijing (2008 and 2009) by the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences.
But an increasing number of private college students say the tight budgets means these institutions fail to attract good faculty, significantly impacting the quality of education and graduates' future employment opportunities.
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"Such discriminatory policies should be abolished at once," he said.
Sun said local governments must make private education a top priority and should include private college teachers in the social security network.
"Private school teachers and public school teachers are all teachers, and they are entitled to the same social security package," he said at the seminar.
