Policies and practices in educational gerontology in mainland China

ABSTRACT

The development of educational gerontology (EG) policies in mainland China has gone through two stages, the social welfare stage (1982–2000) and the lifelong learning stage (2001–present), and a rudimentary system of EG provisions and legislation has been formed. Although a system of EG practices in mainland China has also been built under the guidance of these policies, there are still some loopholes in the policies that hinder the further development of practices, such as a lack of awareness of EG as a separate discipline, misconceptions about lifelong education, and imperfections in the systems, techniques, and content of legislation related to EG. Additionally, there are some major gaps in EG policies and practices in China, unlike in other regions and countries. Therefore, this paper suggests a future EG policy agenda, including enacting legislation such as the Lifelong Education Act or Adult Education Act; improving the quality of the existing provisions and legislation to increase their rationality, standardization and operability; issuing a special law regarding the employment of older people to safeguard their right to learn and work; and launching initiatives to improve EG practices, including initiatives to enhance aging education in school, higher education for older adults, the utilization of older human resources, the cultivation of digital skills among older people, and education for disadvantaged older people.

Acknowledgments

The research entitled “The Educational Construction of Chinese Elders’ Spirituality” (project no. BKA170234), which was featured in this article, was supported by the National General Project of Educational Science, China.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Policies take the form of not only departmental regulations but also regulations, laws, decrees, court rulings, and administrative decisions (Kruschke & Jackson，1987).

2. By September 30, 2021 there were 3,012 institutions of higher learning in China, including 2,756 regular institutions of higher learning (1,270 undergraduate institutions, 1,486 junior colleges) and 256 institutions of higher learning for adults. This list excludes institutions of higher learning from the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Macao Special Administrative Region, and Taiwan region (Ministry of Education, 2021).

3. This refers to effectively reducing the burden of heavy homework and off-campus training for students in compulsory education, which can cut the cost of childrearing and education.

4. About half a century ago, Neugarten (1974) categorized the older population into three groups: young-old (55–65), old-old (66–74), and oldest-old (75–85). As more and more adults reach the age of 100 or over, the division seems to be increasingly outdated. Some Western scholars define adults aged 85 and older as oldest-old (Erber, 2005; Hoyer & Roodin, 2003), while some Chinese scholars have reclassified the older population into young-old (60–70), old-old (70–80), and oldest-old (80+)(Haizhong, 2013; Zhang, 2008).

5. Ethnic autonomous areas are established at the provincial, municipal, and county levels according to the size of the population and the geographic area where the minority people live in compact communities.