Gene Veith noted an interesting potential outcome of allowing the kind of education fit for free people into Hong Kong:
Today, the still-Communist Chinese are blaming the liberal arts curriculum in the schools of Hong Kong for the pro-freedom movement currently roiling that city, with the protests generally led by liberal arts students. The movement is being called “scholarism.” In the mean time, the Chinese government wants to impose a pro-government purely economic curriculum. Sound familiar?
Anything Communists blame for spreading freedom shoots immediately to the top of my “most-wanted” list – in an entirely different sense in which the Party would mean that.
Veith’s note comes at an appropriate time, because Chinese expatriate Yong Zhao’s recent book makes a related critique. The University of Oregon professor argues the Chinese system may be efficient, but it’s also highly dependent on culture (Chinese parents prod their children academically, while American parents are overall rather lackadaisical) and cookie-cutter.
via What America Should and Should Not Learn from Chinese Education | Heartlander Magazine.
