What the U.S. and Chinese school systems have in common: Inequality, segregation
Americans who visit Chinese schools quickly realize that many of our beliefs and assumptions about education hold little water in China: In the United States, our urban public schools perform relatively poorly, but in China the urban systems rate among the nation’s best. Here we often regard private schools as a cut above public ones (though the truth is far murkier), but most Chinese consider public schools to be superior. Americans view public education as a crucial equalizer for a democratic society, in theory at least—but the Chinese see it partly as a means to sort their massive population in a distinctly undemocratic fashion.
Sarah Carr
Despite these differences of conceit, the American and Chinese education systems share one common, defining characteristic: They are both plagued by gross inequalities and rampant segregation. In the United States, these
