From December 14 to 15, 2019, the 32nd annual conference of the Chinese Education Society was held in Jinan, Shandong Province. The theme of this year’s conference was ‘Modernization of Basic Education in 2035: Explorations of Local Schools’. Approximately 2,000 experts and scholars from the Ministry of Education, the Asia-Pacific Bureau of UESCO and many other national educational organizations throughout China attended the conference. 

Professor GAO Yimin and TENG Jun attended the conference on behalf of IICE and organized a parallel session to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the renowned American educator John Dewey’s visit to China, in which around 100 delegates participated. The invited speakers included Charles Alelmann, the current principal of the experimental school affiliated to the University of Chicago, which was founded by John Dewey in 1896, and two teachers of the school, Eli Johnson and Kristin Todd Frank. Participants discussed Dewey’s educational legacies such as learning by doing and children-centered education, and compared such thoughts against China’s current educational practices. It was believed that while Dewey’s thoughts were well accepted by Chinese educational community, many structural arrangements such as large class size, uneven educational development across regions, and problems in assessment have constrained China’s educational modernization. Participants agreed that much work on reform needs to be done.  

Prof. GAO in the summary session concluded that openness and learning from international experiences lay the foundation of educational innovation, and he suggested that the first step for schools to cultivate a culture of modernity should start from updating community activities provided to students at school.