Migrant Children’s Education

Abstract

One of the most pressing challenges facing China’s education system today is the schooling of migrant children – children of rural migrant workers, who are born in the city or move to the city with their parents. Under the household registration (hukou) system, migrant children lack full citizenship rights in the city. Denied access to urban schools, migrant children turned to migrant schools-- private, for-profit schools that provide poor mobility prospects from their low quality education. In response, Chinese policymakers have become concerned that the estimated 20 million migrant children will develop into an urban underclass and, consequently, prioritized the provision of quality schooling to this disadvantaged population. Since 2002, national reforms assert rural migrant children’s right to enroll in urban public schools. Migrant children, however, continue to face obstacles in accessing a quality education in the cities. This chapter address three questions: 1) what is the current educational situation of migrant children’s schooling?, 2) what are the major educational issues hindering migrant children from receiving quality schooling?, 3) what strategies might alleviate some of the problems of migrant children’s schooling? The chapter is organized as follows: first, I discuss the scale and background of migrant children’s emergence in China’s cities. I then outline State educational policies on migrant children and the challenges of policy implementation at the local level. Next, I provide an overview of the current knowledge on migrant children’s school enrollment patterns, family and school factors for migrant children’s academic success, as well as school processes and outcomes that diminish migrant children’s potential to integrate into urban Chinese society. I review earlier studies and also present findings from my own 2011-12 research on the integration of rural and urban youth in Shanghai public schools. This chapter concludes with a discussion on recent policy reforms, left behind children, persisting dilemmas, and future developments.