ABSTRACT
In the educational sphere, 'quality' has been consistently associated with the acquisition of academic credentials rather than the mastery of technical skills. This chapter discusses why this has been so, analysing repeated official attempts to curb demand for academic higher education and divert a major portion of the nation's youth into vocational training. At the 1978 National Conference on Education, Deng Xiaoping made expansion of agricultural and technical/vocational education (TVE) central to plans for secondary schooling reform. The nature of the implemented TVE curriculum was of course highly dependent on the teaching force. A key reason for the increase in vocational enrolments was the relatively measured pace of higher education expansion, which restricted the growth of the regular high school sector. For many students, however, the attractiveness of vocational higher (or secondary) education, such as it is, lies not so much in the skills it imparts as in the route into urban employment or further study it may afford.
