Vigorous Education

As China's political, economic and cultural centre, Beijing has a large number of well-regarded institutions of higher learning in addition to its many cultural and historical institutions. Roaming the campuses of famous Peking University or Tsinghua University, one can easily call to mind the wonderful classes conducted by master professors such as Zhu Ziqing and Hu Shi.

At the end of 2005, Beijing had 79 universities and colleges, 20 more than that of the end of 2000. In 2005, 156,000 new students were enrolled and 117,000 students graduated, leaving 537,000 classmates still studying. Citywide, 51 universities and 111 scientific research institutions offer postgraduate programmes, with 165,000 students working for postgraduate degrees. College and postgraduate student numbers increased to 254,000 and 101,000 more than that of the end of 2000.

In 2005, the city had 917 ordinary high schools, 1,403 primary schools, 25 schools for special education and 1,358 kindergartens (with 202,000 children enrolled). There were 517 privately run schools in the city.

During the Tenth Five-Year Plan, attendance in three-year pre-school educations increased from 75 percent in 2000 to 82 percent in 2004. The compulsory education rate rose to more than 99 percent with stronger government support. The rate for senior high school educations remained at more than 95 percent. In 2004, the average education period for Beijing's registered population of 6-year-olds and over was 10.5 years, the leader in the country.

In 2004, total educational investment from local municipal coffers was 23.5 billion yuan (US$2.94 billion), 1.6 times that found in 2001. The majority of educational investment went to the suburban areas, to the compulsory education in the rural areas, to the financially and educationally weak districts and to counties, schools and to vulnerable groups.

In 2004, the city invested 849 million yuan (US$106.13 million) in rural education. The municipal and district governments invested 2 billion yuan (US$250 million) to set up a three-level educational information network that was composed of a municipal backbone network, a district-county local network and an on-campus network. Basic on-campus networks were established in 1,823 high schools and primary schools in the city. Nineteen districts and counties were linked via optical fibre connections to the Beijing Educational Information Network. By the end of 2005, the Beijing High School and Primary School Education Resources Platform had been launched. The "Single Payment" plan had been officially implemented. A series of policies were made up to reduce the burdens of families living under harsh financial conditions so their children could receive compulsory educations. The municipal and district (county) governments appropriated 90 million yuan (US$11.25 million) each year to subsidize students from financially distressed families.