Lighten the burden of education that is closest to people
On August 27, 2021, in the hall of the double-selection meeting of the Employment Guidance Center for College Graduates in Beijing, the scene of the 2021 Beijing Primary and Secondary School Teachers' Recruitment Fair, a candidate holding a resume.
According to reports, Beijing has gradually promoted the implementation of the "double reduction" policy. The Municipal Education Commission has coordinated and organized various district education commissions to earnestly develop teacher recruitment work plans, actively expand recruitment positions, and launch a new round of public recruitment of primary and secondary school teachers.
China Youth Daily, China Youth Daily reporter Qu Junyan / photo
Re-elected to the National People's Congress for four consecutive terms, Zhou Hongyu, a professor at Central China Normal University, has always focused his attention on the major proposition of China's education reform.
From the classroom to the assembly hall, in the past 20 years, he has used his research and suggestions from the grassroots to continue to encourage and encourage the development of education.
In the past 2021, "double reduction" is the hottest topic in the field of education.
When participating in the two sessions this year, Zhou Hongyu brought five proposals for "double reduction", the core of which is "reducing burden and increasing efficiency", aiming to make the "double reduction" policy truly effective.
Zhou Hongyu grasped a very critical problem in the "one reduction and one increase" - students are freed from the heavy extracurricular burden, but as the main force of the "double reduction" front-line teachers, the burden is even heavier.
Grassroots teachers are the link in the education system that "faces people directly", which is related to the overall situation of education and directly affects the implementation of the "double reduction" work.
Zhou Hongyu pointed out that reducing the burden is of equal importance to teachers and students. Excessive occupational burden restricts the improvement of teachers' personal quality. In the final analysis, it is children who are affected.
"Almost a moment of rest a day"
In recent years, the national and local representatives of the two sessions have always paid attention to "reducing the burden on teachers".
In December 2019, the General Office of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the General Office of the State Council issued a document expressly requesting to clean up and standardize various work affecting primary and secondary education and teaching activities, especially matters not related to education and teaching.
Subsequently, education departments in various places have come up with a "Teacher Burden Reduction List" to ensure that primary and secondary school teachers devote themselves to teaching and educating others.
On July 24, 2021, the "Opinions on Further Reducing the Burden of Homework and Off-campus Training for Students in Compulsory Education" (referred to as the "Double Reduction" Opinion) was released.
In order to implement the "double reduction", many schools have begun to explore and develop after-school services, delayed services, and homework management.
During the survey, Zhou Hongyu found that from a national perspective, the burden on students has indeed been significantly reduced, the size of the education and training market has shrunk, and the role of schools as the main front of education has been further strengthened.
This also means that teachers need to devote more time and energy to their work, and the problem of overburdened teachers has once again caused concern from all parties.
The "double reduction" opinion requires that "after-school services are generally undertaken by the teachers of the school", "after-school service hours, guide students to complete homework conscientiously, provide tutoring and answer questions for students with learning difficulties, and expand learning space for students who have spare capacity for learning. ""Organize excellent teachers to carry out free online interactive exchanges and answer questions" and so on.
Some schools reported that teachers' working hours were significantly prolonged, especially that some class teachers, key teachers and school management cadres were overburdened.
Han Hongtao, the principal of Tianjin Pingshandao Primary School, has been teaching for nearly 30 years. In his opinion, in order to assess how well the "double reduction" is being implemented, the first thing to do is to answer the teacher's question of "do you want it, do you want it, whether it's good or not".
As a representative of the Tianjin Municipal People's Congress, he heard the voices of many front-line teachers and understood their pressure when he visited various schools. Some teachers are still facing difficulties in life.
For example, he said that the head teacher usually arrives at school at 7:00 in the morning and leaves work at 6:30 in the evening. After returning home, he buys vegetables, cooks, prepares lessons, and corrects homework... Many people work more than 10 hours a day, even 12 hours. .
For the head teacher, since most schools currently require students to have lunch at school, they are also responsible for taking care of the students' lunch, "almost not a moment of leisure a day."
Some young teachers have confided to the media that "there is no time to fall in love"; some teachers have to face the dilemma of arriving home after 7 or 8 o'clock in the evening and their children are not taken care of.
In addition to the "burden relief list", hidden burdens still exist
Zhou Hongyu introduced that in the 1990s, the problem of overburdened teachers in our country had already been exposed. "Teachers in primary and secondary schools were occupied too much teaching time by plans, summaries, and forms, and some teachers even said that only 1/6 of their time was devoted to teaching. ".
As of the early 2000s, teachers' workloads mainly came from students' studies.
In recent years, as teachers' internal demands and external demands have changed, they have become more tired.
In local areas, teachers are often valuable human resources, so some township governments incorporate teachers into the management system and arrange a lot of social work that has nothing to do with teaching.
Some teachers who need "advanced education" are busy with various trainings and assessments, and the tendency of teachers' rewards and punishments to be based on political achievements, quantification, non-professionalization, and administrativeization adds to the pressure of this group.
In recent years, the above situation has received attention at the policy level, but the existing teacher burden reduction policy has not yet received full support and participation from the society.
As of the end of February 2021, 28 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities) across the country have made a "list" to try to "relieve the burden" for primary and secondary school teachers.
However, in addition to the "burden reduction list", hidden burdens still exist. During the implementation process, there are phenomena such as "one reduction and another increase", inaccurate grasp of the "degree" of burden reduction, and insufficient supervision of the implementation of the "burden reduction list".
For example, the “burden reduction list” for primary and secondary school teachers in some provinces has reduced the burden of inspections outside the education system, but for inspections within the education system, the situation has basically not changed substantially, making the effect of reducing the burden not obvious.
A reporter from China Youth Daily and China Youth Daily found in an interview that the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia epidemic has increased the daily work of front-line teachers, such as filling in a large number of students and parents' health information, and conveying the requirements of higher-level epidemic prevention and control.
Some schools require students to upload the health codes and itinerary codes of themselves and their living parents before entering the school. Teachers will check them one by one, remind parents to fill in the report, and help correct errors.
Teachers and students must "liberate"
Teachers are relieved, and teachers are liberated; students are relieved, and students are liberated.
Zhou Hongyu believes that reducing the burden on teachers is to prepare for the great improvement of their own quality, and also to pave the way for the high-quality development of students.
Under the pattern of "double reduction", primary and secondary school teachers should grasp the general direction of "reducing while increasing" and "improving quality while increasing".
Taking into account the actual needs of the current teachers, this year's two sessions, many deputies put forward suggestions to do "subtraction" for teachers.
The Central Committee for Democratic Progress suggested that teachers should reasonably reduce the burden and provide effective incentives and guarantees, including revitalizing internal and external teacher resources, making full use of high-quality social resources to expand the supply of after-school services, exploring the implementation of flexible commuting and supplementary rest systems, and providing compensation and incentives. Overtime allowances, teachers with outstanding performance can explore priority promotion and evaluation, etc.
Zhu Yongxin, deputy secretary-general of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and vice-chairman of the Central Committee of the Democratic Progressive Committee, suggested that the staffing of teachers should be appropriately increased, the standard of public funding per student in the compulsory education stage should be adjusted, teachers who participated in after-school services could be effectively motivated, and a mechanism for purchasing public services in off-campus educational institutions should be established.
Zhou Hongyu also suggested that the "flexible commuting system" should be piloted according to the school situation;
He also called for formalism to be avoided in school management.
The core work of the school is to teach and educate people, not to blindly compare, but to focus on education itself.
"The meaningless activities are not carried out, and the meaningless activities are carried out less." Zhou Hongyu believes that helping teachers do a good job of "subtraction" rather than "addition", and create a non-impetuous and quiet working environment for teachers. Only when there is enough time to study teaching to improve teaching efficiency and quality, can students' burden reduction be implemented.
China Youth Daily, China Youth Daily reporter Hu Chunyan Source: China Youth Daily