Peking University, Nov.5, 2011: The World Bank Panel of Beijing Forum 2011 with the theme of "Private Education and Public Finance" was held at Yingjie Overseas Exchange Center, Peking University (PKU). Attendees included domestic economists, scholars from PKU Graduate School of Education (GSE), foreign experts on educational economics, and government officials.

The Role of Private Education

Both at home and abroad, the portion of private education in national education systems can hardly be ignored.

Zhu Zhongming, deputy director of Zhejiang Provincial Department of Finance, said that private education accounts for 51% of all educational institutions in Zhejiang Province. Harry Patrinos, lead education economist at the World Bank, illustrated the increasing private enrollment rate in member countries of Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development with statistics from 1991 to 2003.

Attendees also highlighted the advantages of private schools. Harry Patrinos pointed out that with a strong accountability system and effective information channels, private schools can provide parents with more choices and give them more voice in the operation of schools. Government officials from Zhejiang and Jiangsu emphasized that private schools utilize educational resources fully, offer various choices for students, arouse public schools’ rethinking about their own teaching quality, and contribute to educational reform.

Domestic and Foreign Practices

Ni Daoqian, deputy director of Jiangsu Provincial Department of Education, said that a special fund to promote private education has been established in Jiangsu; public finance provides students in both public and private schools with equal student grants. To provide another example, Professor Yan Fengqiao, deputy dean of GSE, said that in China some renowned public schools’ establishment of private affiliates is a common practice.

Foreign practices in private education are more diverse. Harry Patrinos gave a brief introduction to voucher programs, the Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP) in the U.S., American charter schools, and Britain free schools.

Eduardo Velez, education sector manager for East Asia and the Pacific at the World Bank, illustrated the results of his empirical research on charter schools and concession schools in the U.S. and Columbia. According to his introduction, foreign practices are quite different from those of private education in China. For example, charter schools, which were most frequently mentioned by foreign experts at the panel, are a kind of public-funded schools which are privately operated and free from traditional regulations that the government applies to public schools.

Mao Yushi, president of Unirule Institute of Economics, introduced Milton Friedman’s School Voucher Theory and cited the voucher program in India as an example. He pointed out that India voucher program has led to the polarization of student numbers because there is no marked price on their school vouchers - which hampers the price from adjusting the relationship between supply and need.

Dilemmas and Challenges

Since the enactment of Law of the People’s Republic of China on the Promotion of Private-run Schools in 2003, private education has made rapid advances, while many problems still exist. It is laid down by the law that private education in China should serve public interests, and runners of private schools should expect proper gains. However, as was pointed out by Zhu Zhongming, the term “proper gains” is rather difficult to define. Besides, Ni Daoqian said that ownership which is not clearly defined and chaotic operation are two conspicuous problems in private education.

Professor Yan Fengqiao, in his speech “The Dilemma of Educational Privatization in China: Cases of High Schools in Hebei Province”, pointed out that excessive intervention of government is an obstacle to the development of private education in China.

In his presentation of "Case Study of Private Education in the Netherlands”, Harry Patrinos said that private schools are facing fierce competition with their counterparts because the central government provides funds to private schools according to the number of students in each school. If a school loses its students because of poor teaching quality, it will consequently lose the financial support from the government. Private schools also face great pressure caused by extrinsic inspection and intervention.

Reported by: Chen Jiayu

Edited by: Arthars