[atomicity]

Is China doing anything so that it's worthwhile for students to learn practical skills rather than focus on getting into a college?

It's harder to get society to value college degrees less, but I don't see much changing unless there are many stable, low/medium-risk business opportunities available to those with degrees from lower-ranked schools.

It feels like they are just addressing a symptom, and not trying to tackle the larger issue...so I'm curious why they would do that

[markus_zhang]

You have to understand the mindset of Chinese.

Although a few decades into the industrial society and with the purge of traditional mindsets during the Cultural Revolution, they are not easy to be removed.

The old saying is 万般只有读书高, which basically translates to "Read books and pass your exams and you are going to have a bright future". This reflects the fact that ancient Chinese needed to pass some state exams to be selected as officials. In ancient Chinese (and today still in some parts of China), being "in the bureaucratic system" is the best thing.

Practically skills were looked down (I actually think it was a lot better back in the 50s~80s when people with practical skills were more or less not looked down, but things started to come back in recent decades), Merchants were looked down (but nowadays they enjoy higher status thanks to Capitalism). As a matter of fact, schools that teach practical skills (技校) are looked down and it's a lot easier to get into than the universities.

It's definitely not black and white nowadays (after all we went through a few revolutions in the last century), but the mindset is still there IMHO. It's just buried deep. I'd actually argue that the same mindset can be found in American parents too (Do you want to do X in the future like BoB?)

You are 100% right about just addressing the symptom and that's the what Humphreys do best.

[malandrew]

It's not just a mindset that has been passed on but a mindset that is caused by circumstance.

I used to teach in China and one of the things I noticed that doesn't get attention is the impact of the one-child policy on that one child. You had a largely socialist system that turned largely capitalist so you have all these parents nearing the end of their careers without much to show for it (because they grew up in a largely socialist system) and their main shot at a better life is a single child that they expect to support them beyond what the state provides as they age. This is a recipe for a ridiculous amount of pressure parents put on their single child, and that single child is aware that they have the future burden of supporting two parents in the future. It was really enlightening to witness these consequences first hand.

[markus_zhang]

>I used to teach in China and one of the things I noticed that doesn't get attention is the impact of the one-child policy on that one child.

Actually a lot of people noticed because the previous generation usually have a lot of siblings, like 3-4 are not uncommon.

Agree with you on the other points. The one-child policy is controversial but TBH I'm not in the position to shed more light on this policy. Back then people seemed to be really worried about over-population and others.

I'm not sure how this is going to play out. Population estimation seems to be pretty difficult to do it correctly because there are so many variables. But we will see.