one
Looking at the course of China's educational management system reform in the past 10 years, we can easily find that it basically develops in three directions.
First, the shift from high center of gravity to low center of gravity. In other words, through decentralization, the management right of educational activities in the whole country has been highly concentrated in the central government and the central education administrative department, giving local governments and schools more management rights and autonomy. One of its important means is to reflect the change of top-down management authority in the original system, but only to shift the focus of management from the central government to local governments and schools at all levels, which is not beyond the scope of the original system.
This trend is mainly reflected in two aspects. First, expand the management authority of local governments over local educational activities. In the past, the construction of schools, the setting of specialties and the adjustment of disciplines, the examination and approval of courses, textbooks, teaching outlines and teaching plans, including the distribution and use of various educational funds, were basically managed by the central government and the central education administrative department, while the management authority of local governments and education administrative departments was very limited, and they only played the role of executors. This management mode is consistent with the planned economic system at that time, and it is also the need to make better use of educational resources and maintain the order of educational activities in a specific historical period. However, this model is not conducive to giving full play to the enthusiasm of local schools, and it is difficult to adapt to the differences between different regions with social development and differentiation; Because of the difficulty in collecting and mastering information, it often affects the efficiency of management. Therefore, in the reform of education management system, the central government clearly stipulates that the management right of basic education belongs to local governments. In addition to the central government's decision on major policies and macro-plans, the formulation and implementation of specific policies and plans, as well as the power and responsibility for the leadership, management and inspection of schools, are handed over to local governments. China's "Outline of Education Reform and Development" further puts forward that "the governments of provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government have the right to decide the educational system, the annual enrollment scale, the teaching plan, the selection of teaching materials and the examination and approval of provincial-level teaching materials", and also gives them the right to decide the educational management authority of the governments at the corresponding levels. The second is to expand the autonomy of schools, mainly colleges and universities. Colleges and universities are gradually developing into legal entities that run schools independently by the society under the macro-management of the government in terms of enrollment, adjustment of majors and departments, institutional setup, appointment and dismissal of cadres, financing and use, professional title evaluation, salary distribution and international exchanges.
Second, transfer from the original system to the outside. That is to change the pattern of government-run schools in the past and gradually establish a system with government-run schools as the main body and all sectors of society running schools together.
First of all, the school's host reform has changed from centralization in the past system to diversification in the combination of the host and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In the past, the establishment of schools was completely regarded as the function and power of the government. As a very important social activity, education has also been completely brought under the control of the central planning, thus forming the phenomenon that the government dominates. Undoubtedly, the effective implementation of the socialist education policy and training objectives has been fully guaranteed in the system. However, in the face of the growing demand for education, the government's financial burden is getting heavier and heavier, which also limits the participation of various social forces in running schools and developing education. In recent years, the rise of different social forces, the emergence of private schools, and cooperation with relevant international organizations and institutions reflect the trend of diversification of organizers in the reform of education management system, and show a trend of gradual deepening and expansion.
Secondly, the identities of school organizers, administrators and educators are gradually separated. In the past, in the government-run school system, the school organizers, managers and school leaders appointed by the government were basically the same. The government not only runs schools, but also manages schools, and at the same time becomes the specific operators of schools. Now, on the one hand, there are different organizers outside the system, and the school has gained greater autonomy, which has brought separation and differences between them. This is conducive to better mobilizing all kinds of social resources to develop education and arouse the enthusiasm of running schools, but it also challenges and increases the difficulty of education management.
Third, the change of educational supply and demand from basic coincidence to relative separation. The "educational supply" and "educational demand" mentioned here refer to the different kinds of education and the total amount provided by the whole society, as well as the demand of all levels of society for the above-mentioned types and quality of education. This trend is shown as follows: the educational demand of the society gradually breaks away from the restriction and control of the educational supply provided by the government and gains relative independence. At the same time, the supply of education itself also presents a pluralistic trend. This trend is related to the redistribution of resources in the whole society in the reform. Because all resources under the planned economy system are basically controlled by the central government, it is difficult to say that both localities and individuals are subjects with independent interests, and the central government is also the only subject of education supply, which will inevitably form the basic overlap of education supply and education demand in essence. Through the reform of economic system and the continuous establishment of socialist market economic system, various localities and departments have initially formed certain interest subjects, which are driven and constrained by corresponding interests and become the realistic subjects of educational needs; The reform of labor and personnel system, salary system, enrollment and graduation distribution system also makes education, especially all kinds of education in the non-compulsory stage, intrinsically related to people's own interests, prompting individuals to make more practical and active choices in educational needs. All these make the current social education demand form a state of extremely complex, diversified orientation and relatively independent of education supply. In addition, although the central government still controls the overall educational demand of society from a macro perspective and occupies an important position in the whole educational demand, the educational demand of various regions, departments and even individuals has increasingly become a force to be reckoned with. At the same time, due to the diversification of school subjects, the single subject position of the central government in education supply has also been challenged, forming a certain competitive situation.
In short, the above three trends are basically around changing the phenomenon of high unification and excessive concentration of educational management authority in the past. The reform of entrance examination system, educational title and post system, educational fund structure and management further embodies the above three trends from different aspects.
two
The three major trends of educational management system reform have greatly promoted the overall development of education in China and made remarkable achievements.
First, because the management focus has been lowered, the combination of educational activities with the actual situation and development of various regions has directly brought two benefits: first, it has mobilized the enthusiasm of local governments and people at all levels to develop education and run schools, formed a new support mechanism for educational development, and expanded and increased the investment of the whole society in education; Secondly, education itself is more closely linked with reality, so that education can obtain greater social benefits. On the one hand, it shortens the time and space of information flow, feedback and conversion, increases the directness of management and the pertinence of decision-making, thus reducing the management cost and expenses of education to a certain extent; On the other hand, the school layout, curriculum, selection of teaching materials and the formulation of teaching plans can better meet the requirements of the region than in the past.
Second, it has expanded the autonomy of running a university, created certain conditions for deepening the reform of the university, mobilized the enthusiasm of the teaching staff to a certain extent, enhanced the ability of the university to actively adapt to economic and social development, and promoted the improvement of the quality of running a school, the level of scientific research and the efficiency.
Thirdly, the differentiation of school organizers and the relative separation of managers from organizers and school-running personnel have mobilized more social resources to participate in and support school-running to a certain extent. In recent years, the emergence of various social forces and private schools, as well as the rise of informal and informal education, have become a great supplement to the formal school education with the government as the main body in China, alleviating the pressure of running schools by the government to a certain extent and adapting to the expanding educational needs of modern society. At the same time, due to the relative independence and autonomy of various social forces, their experiments and innovations in school-running concepts, curriculum and teaching have also provided valuable experience for the reform and theoretical research of education and teaching in China. A diversified pattern of running schools is gradually taking shape.
Fourthly, the relative separation between educational demand and educational supply has also promoted the reform and development of education in some aspects. Because all regions and departments, as relatively independent stakeholders, have their own unique educational needs, and the different choices of individuals driven by interests have greatly improved the demand of the whole society for the quantity, quality and categories of education, and gradually become an important force affecting the development of education. In recent years, stimulated by this expanding educational demand, a large number of social forces have emerged, especially private schools and non-academic higher education held in various places. However, the government's investment orientation and policy behavior in education also have to consider the current situation and trend of educational demand more. At the same time, this relative separation can also provide the possibility for improving the efficiency of running schools. Because it can change the thinking and working logic of the school as an administrative subsidiary in the past to a certain extent, and stimulate the school's sense of competition, so that the school can be closer to reality and adapt to the requirements of regional social and economic development.
It should be pointed out that this kind of system reform with the change of management authority as the core can achieve such achievements, which is inseparable from its social background and characteristics, and this is also the difference between it and the "decentralization" in the previous education management system reform. Since 1949, China has made several large-scale adjustments to the education management system, and this reform of the education management system is different from the past in at least the following aspects. First, the past adjustment was only a change in management authority. The relationship between the government and the school has not changed. It is still a direct administrative management, only a change in management organization. The purpose of this reform is to establish a system of macro-management by the government and running schools independently for the society. It is necessary to expand the autonomy of schools and make them legal entities that run schools independently. Second, as far as the government is concerned, the past adjustment was only the decentralization of management authority under the unified decision-making of the central government, and the localities did not have independent decision-making power, but this reform gave them more decision-making power, thus making them more independent and more enthusiastic about running schools. Third, more importantly, the adjustment of authority in the past was carried out on the basis of a highly planned and unified economic system of the central government. Local governments have no independent resource base, and all resources are concentrated in the hands of the central government. From this point of view, the authority of local and schools is actually unfounded. This reform is synchronized with the reform of the economic system, so the acquisition of authority has a more realistic resource base. It is precisely because of these differences that great achievements have been made in the reform of education management system in recent years, which has really promoted the reform and development of education.
three
Although the reform of education management system has greatly promoted the development of education in China, some problems and contradictions often arise in the development because of disharmony and conflict caused by the division of reform, which has not been effectively adjusted and some reforms are improper.
First of all, due to the decentralization of education management authority and the expansion of school autonomy, the conflicts and contradictions between the central government's policies on the overall layout, scale and macro-structure of national education reform and development and the policies of local governments to develop local education and meet local interests, as well as the conflicts and contradictions between the macro-control of education administrative departments and the school's own interests, are gradually becoming major topics for deepening the reform of education management system. On the one hand, some local governments and education administrative departments ignore the repeated orders of the central authorities, expand the enrollment scale and raise the charging standards without authorization. Some misappropriate and intercept various educational funds, resulting in large-scale arrears of teachers' salaries, which has seriously impacted the development of education, especially basic education. Some places are only driven by the fad of one place and one time, and blindly develop higher education when conditions are not available, resulting in the repeated setting of the same or similar disciplines and specialties in the same area or different areas, which can not produce certain scale benefits and waste resources, and so on. On the other hand, in order to overcome the shortage of school-running funds, especially public funds, raise teachers' salaries and improve school-running conditions, some schools have set off a business boom, which has led to a tendency of marketization in school behavior; Some schools violate the policy and issue diplomas indiscriminately; Some primary and secondary schools recruit "bargain students" and "sky-high students" by virtue of their own advantages, which deviates from the basic purpose of compulsory education. All these have led to the decline of school quality and education level to a certain extent, and the school spirit and style of study have been scattered.
Secondly, due to the large number of schools run by social forces and private schools outside the original system, how to coordinate public schools and private schools with different resource bases and fully implement the socialist education policy and policies has also become a prominent issue in the reform of the education management system. Especially in the period of social transformation and educational reform, various norms are still not perfect, and various social forces often violate policies or even violate laws in running schools; Some schools overcharge tuition and fees in order to recover their investment as soon as possible; In order to attract more students, some schools have made the promise of "integration" with foreign countries; Some schools pursue high-grade living conditions, first-class learning facilities and tuition and fees that ordinary people can't afford, so they are called "aristocratic schools"; Some schools take advantage of various opportunities and possibilities to occupy the resources of public schools in disguise, and so on. To some extent, these have caused confusion in the field of education and affected social stability. On the other hand, governments at all levels and education administrative departments have not yet formed effective management of running schools by various social forces, including the lack of unified management institutions, corresponding system norms and effective means.
Finally, due to the diversity of school organizers and the fact that various regions, departments and individuals have become relatively independent subjects of educational demand, the relative separation between educational supply and educational demand has further increased the difficulty of the government's macro-control of education, and contradictions and imbalances have also emerged between the supply and demand of talents at some levels. For example, in the employment distribution of college graduates from 65438 to 0995, the employment of college graduates in many areas is difficult or the supply exceeds demand. Although the reasons are very complicated, a very important factor is that in addition to the college students trained by regular schools, various localities and departments have also trained a large number of junior college students through various forms such as TV University, self-taught examination, staff university, night university and correspondence. Because most of these students are studying on the job, there will be no vacancies in various departments, which will reduce the demand for talents in colleges. For another example, driven by interests, many people tend to choose majors with higher personal returns and incomes, resulting in insufficient students in some basic theoretical disciplines and agricultural and forestry disciplines, and even shrinking, and so on. This contradiction and imbalance between supply and demand often leads to the waste of educational resources and social instability.
Obviously, understanding and solving the above problems has become a major task and task to deepen the reform of education management system. However, it must be pointed out that with the development of society and the differentiation of education itself in structural entity elements, functions, resources and various relationships, as well as the conflicts caused by differentiation, the above problems are inevitable. The key is to objectively analyze the social environment in which these problems occur, determine some established external factors, and find out those aspects that can be adjusted and changed through subjective efforts and human factors, so as to gradually improve China's education management system.
Among the complex reasons for the above problems, the increasing demand for education in modern society and the shortage of education funds are undoubtedly a fundamental factor, which constitutes the macro-social environment and established external factors for the reform of China's education management system. However, from the subjective and artificial aspects, the adjustment and renewal of management functions and methods in the reform of education management system, the legal norms and policy guidance in education management, and the quality and level of some education managers are also urgent problems to be solved. Among these factors, the author thinks that it is also a prominent problem that some educational management system reforms are not suitable for economic system reform. In a word, the reform of educational management system should and must be based on the reform of economic system and adapt to the requirements of economic system reform for education, but it must not simply imitate the model of economic system reform.
four
Comparing the reform of economic management system with the reform of education management system, we can see that from the decentralization of management authority to the transfer of management authority from the inside to the outside of the system; From the expansion of the autonomy of enterprises and schools to breaking the iron rice bowl and implementing the appointment system, there are indeed great similarities between the two. Fundamentally speaking, this similarity is determined by the relationship between education and economy. In this sense, the reform of education management system in China must adapt to the reform of economic system. Specifically, it is to change the past government-run and highly centralized management mode, implement "graded running and graded management", mobilize local enthusiasm, encourage all sectors of society to participate in running schools, and give schools certain autonomy, and so on. However, if we completely ignore the inherent laws and particularity of educational activities and change "adaptation" into "imitation" without reservation, it is likely to have a negative impact on educational reform and development. In other words, some laws and characteristics of educational activities restrict the reform of educational management system from pursuing the same mode and thinking as the reform of economic system. In this regard, this article only talks about some views from the following two aspects.
First, the division of educational management authority cannot be implemented or delegated to too low a management level like the economic system reform. If we carefully analyze the basis of authority division in management activities, we can find that any division of authority is linked to responsibility and interest, which is the so-called combination of responsibility, power and interest. Therefore, the division of authority is actually related to the division of responsibilities and interests. If we focus on the interest level for the time being, we can think that the division of any management authority is closely related to the relative separability of the interests related to these authorities. The so-called "relative separability of interests" here mainly means that the interests of some management activities can be monopolized by the subjects who are relatively involved in these activities and have certain exclusivity. Obviously, the higher the relative divisibility of this interest, the more specific the division of authority can be; Or vice versa, the difference in relative separability between the income of economic activities and the income of educational activities from Dallas to the auditorium should constitute the different basis of their decentralization model in the reform of management system. From the comparison, we can find that the relative separability of the income from educational activities is less than that from most economic activities. Because education, on the whole, is a specific shared resource and service with greater public welfare. Although individuals or specific departments can also get some direct returns through education, the social public benefits of educational development are greater than those of individuals and specific departments, and society is the main beneficiary of educational investment benefits. This feature is mainly manifested in two aspects. First, by developing education and raising the level of education for all, we can greatly improve the quality of the whole nation, optimize the social atmosphere and living environment, improve interpersonal relationships and reduce contradictions and conflicts in the whole society. Everyone can benefit from such social public interests, and at the same time, while benefiting themselves, others are not excluded from benefiting from them. Therefore, the principle of investment and income distribution in economic activities is not completely applicable in educational activities. The second is the mobility of talents trained by education at all levels. All kinds of talents trained by some regions or departments often flow to other regions or departments, especially basic education, and excellent students always leave the region by going to college. Similar phenomena also exist in higher education and vocational and technical education, including the education of enterprise employees. Therefore, it is impossible for regions, departments and even individuals who invest in education to fully enjoy all the comprehensive benefits it produces, while those regions and departments that do not directly invest in education or invest less can also enjoy the benefits brought by educational development to a certain extent. It is precisely because of the influence of such an interest mechanism that some regions and departments may naturally reduce their enthusiasm and motivation for educational development in their own regions and departments without other constraints, and strive to obtain public benefits from educational development in other regions. All these will directly lead to the reduction of education funds and a series of chain negative effects.
From another point of view, education, as a shared resource and service, has great public welfare, and serves the whole society more, so the wider its service scope and the more clients it serves, the greater its benefits will be. At the same time, in order to effectively improve the scale benefit of education, we should emphasize some kind of common responsibility and pay attention to the relative concentration of responsibility and authority.
In addition, education, as an activity to promote and realize social justice and equality, always makes people get opportunities suitable for their own development, narrow differences and adjust social conflicts through the constant pursuit of equal educational opportunities and different degrees of realization. Obviously, in general, this function of education should be based on social income redistribution, so it can only be realized by a certain degree of macro-control authority.
However, in some rural areas and backward areas in China, the management authority of basic education has been delegated to the township, a rural grass-roots administrative organization. Due to the characteristics of basic education and the inherent constraints of villages and towns as a region with relatively independent interests, it is difficult for multi-level managers to truly form their responsibility and concern for education driven by the interest mechanism, thus making the investment and management of education funds, including the additional collection of rural education funds, and the salaries and treatment of teachers lose the guarantee of effective management system to a certain extent. 1994 the measures taken by the state education commission in some areas to recover the educational management authority from the county government also reflect this point.
Second, although we want to give schools a certain degree of autonomy and enhance their vitality, we must never regard primary and secondary schools as basic education as completely independent social micro-foundations. The establishment of socialist market economy requires most economic departments and enterprises in society to become independent and self-financing entities. The basis is that they, as material production and business units, have greater independence in objectives, operating mechanisms and interests; Its purpose is to make the equivalent exchange in the market possible and realize the law of value. Therefore, through the adjustment of the market, resources are allocated according to the principle of maximizing interests. On the contrary, primary and secondary schools that undertake the task of national compulsory education have school-running objectives and operating mechanisms stipulated by the state. It is not a public institution, does not participate in exchange activities in the market, and is not directly or completely affected by the law of value and market regulation. More importantly, it is not based on the principle of maximizing economic benefits, but on maximizing social benefits, including personnel training and educational equity. Because primary and secondary schools have these characteristics as basic education, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China's "Decision on Educational System Reform" points out that "unification is too dead" is mainly aimed at institutions of higher learning. Therefore, in the reform of the educational management system that gives schools autonomy, primary and secondary schools should not be regarded as completely independent units, let alone put them on the market and independently assume the responsibility of running schools through market exchange. Otherwise, it will bring at least two disadvantages. First, the distortion of school behavior. In other words, the school is not based on educating people, aiming at continuously improving the quality and level of education, but trying to maintain the survival of the school and improve the treatment of teachers, so that income generation has become the top priority of the school. Second, as a basic education, the gap between primary and secondary schools is getting bigger and bigger, and the contrast between key schools and backward schools in all aspects is becoming more and more obvious. Therefore, the fairness and equality of compulsory education cannot be guaranteed. It should be compulsory education that narrows and restrains social gap and inequality, but promotes social gap and inequality to some extent. In this case, all kinds of compulsory education measures such as "attending school nearby" cannot be realized. Therefore, it fundamentally violates the purpose of compulsory education. In recent years, the marketization tendency of school behavior in basic education and various phenomena that violate the laws of education are all related to this to some extent.
In a word, the state should take the necessary responsibility for compulsory education, so as to ensure the real implementation of compulsory education. Although the national education funds are insufficient, schools are allowed to raise education funds through school-run industries, but they must not be allowed to fully assume the responsibility of income generation. Although the government wants to change the situation of running schools, it allows social forces to run schools and private schools to exist; Although there are gaps in compulsory education, the orientation of education reform must not acquiesce in these gaps or expand them, but narrow them as much as possible through macro-control and increasing investment. Therefore, the autonomy and related responsibilities of primary and secondary schools should be restricted and they cannot become independent "legal persons".
To sum up, we can see that the reform of educational management system can not simply imitate and emulate the reform of economic system in theory and practice, but must consider the laws and characteristics of educational activities itself while "adapting". However, we must further realize that there are many factors that affect the reform of education management system and the division of powers, such as the allocation and distribution of resources in the whole society, the balanced development of various departments in various regions of society, and so on. Since the 1980s, some western developed countries have adopted decentralization measures and achieved results in the reform of education management system, to some extent, based on the relatively balanced development of their society and other factors. With the widening gap in China's current social transformation areas, they can't simply be the targets for us to emulate.
Of course, the above analysis does not mean that the education management system must maintain a highly centralized and unified model of the central government. In order to better improve the management level and efficiency and fully mobilize the enthusiasm of governments at all levels and the whole society to run education, the education management system should be simplified and decentralized; In order to alleviate the shortage of national education funds and give schools some autonomy, it is also necessary to raise education funds through multiple channels. The problem lies in its scope and limits, which are subjects to be further studied and practiced.