People's Republic of China Mid-Late 1950s-1960???

With China's education sector having expanded multiples across the nation in order to teach all of society, irregardless of race, class, or gender, something that has come up is the lack of a nationalized curriculum. While the min-pan have been relatively successful, secondary level education has suffered from a lack of national attention and focus previously given to primary education. While illiteracy has gone down quickly over the past few years and the general education level of the populace has gone up, a barrier has occurred with many students struggling in secondary classes. Those that succeed tend to be those already predisposed to succeed, ie, students living in more affluent coastal regions, primarily those in major urban centers. If China is to succeed in the upcoming decades, the rural/urban educational divide must be eliminated or at the very least heavily mitigated.

This does not mean a weakening of standards to pass in the rural interior, nor does it mean the clamping down of our 'best and brightest' in the cities, but it means an increased focus on the rural populace. After all, why tear down the ceiling when the floor can be raised?

Part of the rural populace's lack of ability to succeed in China's educational system is primarily due to outdated education techniques currently in practice across the country. While urban dwellers are able to succeed in this system due to a lack of a need to participate in farm labor, rural dwellers do not have the luxury of idleness. While recent agricultural advancements has mitigated this requirement, students work and struggle in the classroom, or burn themselves out too young and are of no use to the Party and the nation. To solve two birds with one stone, the rural inability to succeed and the urban luxury of 'idleness', China's curriculum and classes shall be reformed for secondary education.

Class structure shall follow an organized period, allowing for six classes on Mondays and Fridays, meant to help reinforce concepts taught earlier in the week/semester, and introduce new concepts that will be taught more in-depth in the middle of the week. On week-days, classes will alternate so that each class taught on Monday and Friday will be taught twice between Tuesday-Thursday. During breaks, students will go to either clubs/extracurricular activities (that generally promote the ideals of socialism in a 'kid'-oriented manner), or have the ability to relax/unwind in-between classes. During study hall, work assigned to kids will be done to avoid burdening children after school, and to allow for more personalized education in an environment a kid will be most likely to succeed. Those with apprenticeships will be permitted to go upon the conclusion of their work in study hall. To avoid an imbalance of students leaving early and to provide the needed time so that students may receive a proper education, classes on Tuesday/Thursday will be lengthened with break times and lunch remaining the same. The average day of the student will be to arrive at school at 8:30am, and leave school around 4:00pm.

The curriculum will be reorganized as follows, shifting from multiple lines of instruction (chemistry and physics being taught concurrently as one example), each period will have an associated 'theme' that will need to be taught, with each new school year building upon what was built last year, becoming progressively more difficult and less specialized. Among the subjects to be taught will be Mathematics, Science, Chinese, History, Civics with the last period being dedicated to 'electives'. Among the electives taught will be local cultures/traditions (within China and the socialist system), foreign languages, as well as a variety of other classes including art, music, and live skills.

While this fixes the problem of rural advancement by modernizing the education system and providing more time for students to both work and learn without harming both, this reorganization does not help urban dwellers who might be able to 'slack' off following study hall in the evenings. As an unoccupied mind might wander and not help advance socialism in China, the Chinese government has announced programs to boost patriotic education and participation in Chinese society outside of school. Civic groups, aiming to bring students into a wide-range of government approved activities and sectors will be established in order to maximize student potential but also bring urban students into fields they might have previously not been interested in before. These civic groups will also help establish a balance to avoid the flooding of any particular sector with students who can not fill the limited job demands. Apprenticeships and activities outside of the classroom will be endorsed and encouraged so that our future will take inspiration from our best and brightest, and therefore provide for a better generation.