STEM Education in China
From Ling Wang
The counterpart of the term “STEM” in China should be “Li Gong Ke”, which is translated from the English words “science and technology” and becomes a general term of math, science, technology and engineering. In China, the education of ‘’Li Gong Ke” (STEM) is primarily provided at the level of higher education. During basic education, which includes elementary and secondary education (comparable to K-12 education in the U.S.), math and science—especially math—receive much more attention because they are among the subjects in the Gaokao, China's national college entrance exam. Students start to learn math and some simple science in elementary school. When the students go to middle school, they study specific science courses such as Chemistry, Physics and Biology. Since math is always one of the three mandatory subjects in the Gaokao, the students have to reach a certain math level before they can go to any college, regardless of major. Compared to the students in the U.S., more students in China choose STEM majors because STEM degrees provide a wide range of career options. According to a 2008 study, 51% of bachelor's degrees awarded in China were in the field of STEM, compared to 31% in the U.S. More recent studies have indicated even higher discrepancies between China and the U.S. in this regard.

Compared to the long tradition of math and science education, technology education was incorporated into the curriculum of basic education only about 10 years ago. Before that, technology education was only conducted in a course called Labor Skills in certain schools and had no curriculum standards. With the expansion of China’s curriculum reform in 2004, technology has become a new compulsory curriculum subject in high schools and is taught in two courses: General Technology and Information Technology. These courses are designed to offer students the opportunity to design, create, and test—so that their innovation and critical thinking abilities can be developed through practice. Also, many elementary schools with strong resources teach Information Technology from grades K-3. Although technology has become a subject in the schools in China, it isn’t a subject in the Gaokao exam. Therefore, whether technology education will actually be implemented in the schools is still a question.

In China, engineering education is almost zero during basic education. The schools don’t teach engineering as a course, but the students may obtain some engineering knowledge unsystematically from their science lessons about certain topics. For example, the teachers may mention gene engineering when they give the lessons about DNA. Also, only very few advanced students might have the opportunity to learn and experience engineering when they participate in some competitions—such as model aircraft competitions, robot contests etc.

One of the important goals of STEM education is to develop creative and innovative compound talents in students. To achieve this goal, teachers must adopt new teaching methods, such as inquiry-based or research-based pedagogies. However, under the high pressure of the Gaokao exam, Chinese teachers must feed as much knowledge as possible to their students, and the students just passively receive this information from their teachers—with hardly any opportunities to investigate by themselves. This is because the traditional teacher-centered teaching method has proven to be the most efficient way for students to score high in the Gaokao exam. Today Chinese educators are concerned about the side effects of the Gaokao exam on students’ creative/innovative abilities, and policy makers are promoting inquiry-based teaching/learning. However, most teachers are not willing to change their teaching style because the benefits from the new teaching methods will not be reflected in Gaokao results, and thus the teachers are not motivated to change. Certainly the traditional teacher-centered method does have some proven strengths, and the Chinese students usually have a solid knowledge foundation and strong math skills. However, in these times it is innovative thinking that is the key to success for a person—and even for a nation. Therefore, teachers, parents and policy makers should be aware of this reality and take actions accordingly.

Of course, STEM education is not just the simple addition of the above-mentioned four fields, and it should be taught in an integrated way, which requires the teachers to broaden their knowledge, redesign their curriculum contents, adopt new teaching methods, and develop new assessment tools. Moreover, how to prepare STEM teachers? How to improve the evaluation system, especially in China, and how to reform the Gaokao exam? How to generate the funding to support STEM education? These difficult questions are waiting for answers in China as well as in the U.S.

Ling Wang is the Chinese liaison for the MIT BLOSSOMS project in China. She has a master's degrees in both chemical education and analytical chemistry. She worked as a high school chemistry teacher in China before coming to the U.S. eleven years ago.

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