Educational Policy Borrowing in China

Charlene Tan is an associate professor at the Policy and Leadership Studies Academic Group, National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University. A visiting scholar at the Institute of International and Comparative Education, Beijing Normal University in 2013, she has been teaching school leaders, teachers and administrators from various parts of China since 2008.

• Preface1. Concepts, Theories, and Models of Educational Policy Borrowing2. Educational Policy Borrowing in China: Historical Perspectives3. Introduction to the New Curriculum Reform in China4. Looking West: Chinese Perceptions of the New Curriculum Reform5. The New Curriculum Reform in the Classroom6. Constructivism and Postmodernism for Education in China: A Critique7. Looking East: Confucian Influences on Chinese Education8. When East Meets West: Cultural Scripts, Indigenisation and the ‘Teacher-Directed, Student-Engaged’ Approach9. Surprises and Paradoxes in China’s Education Reform: The Example of Dulangkou Secondary School10. Conclusions and Implications

'This remarkable book contributes in multiple ways both to our understanding of current schooling and educational issues in China, and of processes of educational and cultural borrowing, a core theme in the field of Comparative Education. It is broad in scope as well as rich in empirical depth. ... I see this book as bringing an unusual depth and richness to insights into the process of educational borrowing, a core theme in the field of comparative education, also to the understanding of China’s current educational reform process.' - Professor Ruth Hayhoe, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto (in Frontiers of Education, Volume 11, Issue 3)'Overall, this is a remarkable and impressive piece of work, which has not only gone through the mechanics and politics of China’s borrowing policy from the West and its uptake in practice, but also dig deep into its cultural and historical roots for an explanation of the surprising and paradoxical development from both the borrower’s and the borrowee’s perspectives. There is no denying that it is a great contribution to the exploration of policy borrowing in the rarely touched Chinese context and a valuable addition to the reservoir of comparative education research as well.' - Qiuxian Chen & Ru Zhang, Foreign Language School, Shanxi University, Taiyuan, China (in Asia Pacific Journal of Education, Vol 39, issue 1)