China Daily has now published the Chinese government’s reaction to the proposal that the time spent studying English in state schools should remain at the current level.
This took the form of a deputy in the government pushing for a reduction in time spent on learning English. However, the Ministry of Education has said that, as stipulated in the 2014 guideline issued by the State Council, Chinese, maths and English are all equally weighted in the gaokao, which is the national college entrance exam, and therefore should remain on the curriculum with the current percentage of teaching hours. Of the 750 points needed to pass the gaokao, each of these subjects carries roughly 150 points, therefore time spent teaching English should not be reduced.
The ministry’s response has triggered a massive reaction on social media, with the (unusually long for the internet) hashtag ‘education ministry responding to the proposal to reduce the weighting of English teaching’ reaching 520 million hits on microblogging platform Sina Weibo as of 27 September.
