Ignition for Education

Invisible China: How the Urban-Rural Divide Threatens China’s Rise, by Scott Roselle and Natalie Hell (2020, University of Chicago Press)

Roselle (a development economist at Stanford) and Hell (a researcher who works with Roselle at the Rural Education Action Program) argue that China may become caught in a middle-income trap because of shortcomings in its human capital. Although urban China is producing kids with the education and skills to carry the country to high-income status, including an army of engineers, rural China–where, thanks to the country’s bizarre system of more-or-less permanently registering everyone with their place of birth, two-thirds of its children live—is way behind. China has invested in rural schools and teachers, but way fewer than half of young people are completing high school. Children’s development is stunted by nutritional shortcomings, lack of vision care, untreated intestinal parasites, and a parenting style that, while loving, does not provide infants with needed stimulation.

You may be wondering, “What’s this about a middle-income trap? Isn’t China already a rich country, second only to and perhaps on its way to passing the United States?” You’re not wrong, if you’re thinking about gross national income. However, China’s population is about four times larger than that of the United States (and larger than that of any other country except India). In terms of per capita national income, China is only around the middle of the global pack. Roselle and Hell convincingly show that, however fast countries grow to reach middle-income status, few escape it. Those that do (including, interestingly, Taiwan) invest in education earlier than China has and achieve much better high-school graduation rates.

Roselle and Hell’s conclusions are based on extensive research, conversations, and work with educators in China, as well on data from outside of their and their colleagues’ research. Invisible China is a persuasive book, and it’s made all the more so by its authors’ palpable desire to see the Chinese people continue to escape poverty and the problems that accompany it.

So, why would this be interesting to educators in the United States and other high-income countries? Well, firstly, it affirms the importance of what we do. Children need the knowledge and skills that we help them to learn. And I don’t just mean basic literacy and numeracy. I mean the higher-level academic skills that children tackle as they grow older.

On that point, the authors compare China’s mostly failing technical-track high schools with Germany’s world-renowned ones. One of the differences that they find, to Germany’s favor, is that what its technical-track high schools offer isn’t an alternative to academic education. It is in fact a serious core academic program with career-specific add-ons.

Secondly, Invisible China shows that nutrition and health in general matter to educational outcomes. While few rich world kids suffer from the specific health problems that Invisible China focusses on, this nonetheless makes me feel vindicated in arguing that policies to improve income support and healthcare for the poorest citizens of any country will help its children to learn.

This is worthwhile reading for educators and everyone interested in education and education policy.