Students stay home ... and go to school

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Unlike other parents under stress at the start of the new semester, Beijing resident Leng Shan has no worries about the school run, or any other of the normal cares of parenthood. His eight-year-old son is educated at home.

Dissatisfied with traditional schools, Leng, a graduate of Peking University, quit his job to educate his child at home a few years ago.

He wrote up proposals for his son’s home instruction and gives basic courses such as English, French, German and math. In his spare time, he is a freelance translator.

“It’s really competitive to get into the best schools in Beijing, but home schooling can save lots of trouble, and you need not worry about your children’s safety either,” he said, adding that his son will be home-schooled until he goes to college.

Home schooling is the choice for more and more Chinese parents, especially those from economically developed regions such as Guangdong and Zhejiang, and, of course, Beijing, as quality education is still scarce and doubts about China’s education system have been growing.

According to the latest report by the 21st Century Education Research Institute, roughly 18,000 people are considering or already practicing home schooling on the Chinese mainland. More than half of those chose home schooling because of dissatisfaction with the educational philosophy in China’s schools.

Yuan Peikun, from Qingdao in east China’s Shandong Province, is also opting for home instruction.

“We just felt like the system was failing my son, and much of what the school is teaching is useless,” said Yuan.

Yuan pays much attention to ancient Chinese masterworks, such as the Analects by Confucius. He said learning the classics teaches a lot about life.

In addition to parent-to-child home schooling, small-sized private home schools have emerged. Zhang Qiaofeng, 48, started such a school in Beijing which had a maximum of eight students each semester last year.

Zhang, also a Peking University graduate, said: “I hope my home school will become China’s Eton to foster talent with the integration of virtue, culture and courage.”

The increasing interest in home-schooling, said Xiong Bingqi, vice president of the institute, is expected to bring reform to regular schools.

• Chinese students usher in new semester

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