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TitleGuanxi exclusion in rural China: parental involvement andstudents' college access

Advisor(s) Postiglione, GA

Author(s) Xie, Ailei.;Œ r xÊ

.

Citation

Issued Date 2012

URL http://hdl.handle.net/10722/173833

RightsThe author retains all proprietary rights, (such as patent rights)and the right to use in future works.

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  i 

GUANXI EXCLUSION IN RURAL CHINA:

Parental Involvement and Students’ College Access 

By

XIE Ailei

A thesis submitted for the Degree of

Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Education

at The University of Hong Kong

March 2012

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ABSTRACT OF THESIS ENTITLED

Guanxi Exclusion in Rural China: Parental Involvement

and Students’ College Access 

Submitted by

XIE Ailei

For the degree of Doctor of Philosophy

at The University of Hong Kongin March2012

This study examines the differential patterns of access to higher education of

students from rural areas in transition from a planned to a market economy. In

respect to college access, the research argues that market reforms have reproduced

the advantages for students from the cadre‟s and the professional‟s families while

simultaneously creating new opportunities for the children of the new arising

economic elite. Yet, it has performed less for traditional peasant families whose

children still fail to gain access to college in proportions higher than the size of

the population.

Based on the literature, this research places a special emphasis on how economic

and cultural resources become the main influence on rural students‟ college access.

The process dimension -- how families from different social backgrounds within

rural society involve themselves in the schooling of their children and how this

contributes to inequality of college access within rural society, are investigated.

This research unpacks this process by examining the school involvement

experiences of parents in Zong, a county located in the province of Anhui.

Parental involvement is conceptualized in terms of how economic and cultural

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  iii 

resources are converted to social capital as part of family strategies within the

increasingly stratified social context of rural China. The research identifies the

consequences of activating different types of social networks within family and

community, and also between family and school to facilitate this process by

gaining advantages in access to college. Household interviews and field notes

were used as the main methods of data collection with a range of parents and

teachers involved in this ethnographic study.

The data analysis suggests that state, schools and teachers provide few formal and

routine channels for rural parents to become involved in schooling. This raises the

importance of family strategic initiatives to employ interpersonal social networks

( guanxi) within family, community and between school and family. Parents from

cadres and professional backgrounds are capable of maintaining these social

networks that are useful for their children‟s chances of entering higher education.

Their counterparts from the new economic elites‟ backgrounds have developed

the means to capitalize upon their families economic and cultural resources by

converting them into social capital that creates advantages in college access for

their children. Peasants, however, rely heavily on teachers and relatives in

education and are substantially marginalized from those important interpersonal

social networks of capital conversion.

Although this research found the structure constrains interpersonal social network

of peasant families, it also highlights the agency of parents from different families.

For example, in some cases it found, that peasants actively use their kinships to

create chances for school involvement to potentially improve the chances of their

children‟s college access.

This research is one of the first empirical studies to inquire about the mechanism

of capital conversion in affecting higher education opportunities in the

 post-socialist era, which will help to re-evaluate the influence of market reforms

over rural education system in China. 

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DECLARATION

I declare that this thesis represents my own work, except where due

acknowledgement is made, and that it has not been previously included in a thesis,dissertation or report submitted to this University or to any other institution for a

degree, diploma or other qualifications.

Signed ............................................................................... 

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  vi 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT OF THESIS ................................................................................................................ II 

DECLARATION ............................................................................................................................ V TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................................. VI 

LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................................ IX 

LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................................... X 

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ............................................................................................................ XI 

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................................. XII 

CHAPTER ONE ............................................................................................................................. 1 

INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................... 1 

1.1  INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................................... 1 

1.2  BACKGROUND ....................................................... ................................................................. . 1 

1.2.1  Higher education in China: expansion, marketization and equality  ....................... 1 

1.2.2  Who goes to colleges and universities and why?  .................................................... 4 1.3  RATIONALE OF THIS STUDY ............................................................. ............................................ 9 

1.4  RESEARCH PROBLEM .............................................................................................................. 10 

1.5  THE DEFINITION OF TERMS ............................................................. .......................................... 11 

1.6  THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THIS STUDY ............................................................................................. 12 1.7  STRUCTURE OF THE DISSERTATION ............................................................. ................................ 13 

CHAPTER TWO .......................................................................................................................... 14 

MARKET, RURAL SOCIETY AND EDUCATION IN TRANSITION .................................................... 14 

2.1  INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................... 14 2.2  MARKET TRANSITION, RURAL SOCIETY AND ITS TRANSFORMATION .................................................. 14 

2.2.1  Market reforms and rural economy  ....................................................................... 14 

2.2.2  Wealth, poverty and inequality  ............................................................................. 17  2.3  RURAL SCHOOLING AND CHILDREN IN THE TRANSITIONAL ERA ........................................................ 23 

2.3.1  The changing landscape of rural education .......................................................... 23 

2.3.2  Challenges to Rural Schooling and Beyond  ........................................................... 29 

2.4  CHAPTER SUMMARY .......................................................... ..................................................... 33 

CHAPTER THREE ....................................................................................................................... 34 

LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ............................................................ 34 

3.1  INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................... 34 

3.2  STATE, MARKET AND FAMILY .......................................................... .......................................... 34 3.2.1  The redistributive system and its influence on educational attainment  .............. 35 

3.2.2  Market economy and educational attainment  ..................................................... 37  

3.3  PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT AND SOCIAL CLASS ......................................................... ..................... 38 3.4  FORMS OF CAPITAL AND THEIR CONVERSION ............................................................................... 41 

3.5  SOCIAL CAPITAL, INEQUALITY AND EDUCATION ....................................................... ..................... 47 

3.5.1  Social capital: origins and definitions .................................................................... 48 

3.5.2  Social capital as a process ...................................................................................... 53 

3.5.3  Social capital in creating advantages for school success ...................................... 56 

3.6  CHINA’S SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION, CULTURE AND GUANXI ............................................................ 61 

3.7  THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ..................................................................................................... 65 

CHAPTER FOUR ......................................................................................................................... 71 

METHODOLOGY ....................................................................................................................... 71 

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4.1  INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................... 71 

4.2  WHY ETHNOGRAPHIC APPROACH .............................................................. ................................ 71 4.3  ACCESS ..................................................... ................................................................. .......... 73 

4.3.1  The selection of filed site and entry  ....................................................................... 74 

4.3.2  Sampling and access to informants ....................................................................... 77  4.4  DATA COLLECTION ............................................................ ..................................................... 81 

4.4.1  Interview  ................................................................................................................. 82 4.4.2  Documents .............................................................................................................. 86 

4.4.3  Field notes............................................................................................................... 87  4.5  DATA ANALYSIS ..................................................................................................................... 88 

4.6  REFLECTION .......................................................... ................................................................ 91 

CHAPTER FIVE ........................................................................................................................... 94 

INSTITUTIONAL SOCIAL CONNECTIONS BETWEEN SCHOOL AND HOME: THE MISSING LINKAGE

 ................................................................................................................................................. 94 

5.1  INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................... 94 

5.2  STATE SCHOOLING AND THE PATHWAY TO COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES ............................................ 95 

5.2.1  School system and enrollment  ............................................................................... 95 

5.2.2  Selection and competition...................................................................................... 97  

5.3  TOWARD-SOCIAL-CAPITAL CONVERSION: PARENTS’ VOICES ABOUT SCHOOL INVOLVEMENT ................. 100 

5.3.1  Material and emotional support  物质和情感支持 ...................................... 100 

5.3.2  Managing ( 管 ) ...................................................................................................... 102 

5.3.3  Tutoring ( 教

 ) ......................................................................................................... 104 

5.3.4  Knowing the academic scores ( 知道分数

 ) ........................................................... 105 

5.3.5  School Choice ( 择校

 ) ............................................................................................. 107  

5.4  VAGUE SANJIEHE (三结合) : MISSING THE LINKAGE BETWEEN FAMILY AND SCHOOL ........................ 108 

5.5.1  Trinity become one force: the interdependence of family, school and community 

  109 

5.5.2  Vague way of Sanjiehe: the separation of family and school  ............................. 111 

5.5  RESTRICTED ACCESS TO SCHOOLING: TEACHERS’ VOICES ABOUT PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT .................. 113 5.5.1  Marginalized roles: the perceived importance of parent by teachers in schooling

  113 

Providing information ........................................................................................................ 113 

Supervising after-class activities ........................................................................................ 114 

Managing the exceptional case ......................................................................................... 115 

5.5.2  Limited inter-connectedness: formal channels for parents to involve................ 117  

5.5.3 .................................................................................................................................... 117  

Home visits .......................................................................................................................... 117  

Parents meeting.................................................................................................................. 119 

 Academic Performance Notice (APN) ................................................................................. 121 

5.6  CHAPTER SUMMARY AND DISCUSSION ........................................................ .............................. 122 

CHAPTER SIX ........................................................................................................................... 125 

PARENTS’ STRATEGIES: GUANXI AS A RESPONSE .................................................................... 125 

6.1  INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................... 125 

6.2  PEASANT: RELYING ON TEACHERS AND THE STRONG TIES WITHIN FAMILIES ...................................... 125 

6.2.1  Relying on teachers .............................................................................................. 125 

6.2.2  Skipped generational raising ( 隔代教养 ) ............................................................ 127  

6.2.3  Kinships and relatives ........................................................................................... 131 6.3  CADRE AND PROFESSIONALS: REPRODUCING STRONG TIES WITH COLLEAGUES .................................. 134 

6.3.1  Family and community  ......................................................................................... 134 

6.3.2  Colleagues and friends ......................................................................................... 138 

6.4  THE NEW ECONOMIC ELITES: PRODUCING INTERPERSONAL TIES WITH TEACHERS ............................... 142 

6.4.1  Peidu (accompany studying) 陪读  ................................................................... 142 6.4.2  Giving gifts and hosting banquets for teachers .................................................. 145 

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6.5  CHAPTER SUMMARY AND DISCUSSION ........................................................ .............................. 147 

CHAPTER SEVEN ..................................................................................................................... 151 

CONSEQUENCES: INTENDED AND UNINTENDED ..................................................................... 151 

7.1  INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................... 151 

7.2  INTENDED CONSEQUENCES .................................................................................................... 151 7.2.1  School engagement and promotion .................................................................... 151 

7.2.2   Access to model schools and key classes ............................................................. 154 

7.2.3  Teachers’ care关照

  .......................................................................................... 156 

7.3  UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES ....................................................... ......................................... 157 

7.3.1  Complains and distrust  ......................................................................................... 157  

7.3.2  Social relations reproduced  .................................................................................. 159 

7.4  CHAPTER SUMMARY AND DISCUSSION ........................................................ .............................. 160 

CHAPTER EIGHT ...................................................................................................................... 162 

CONCLUSIONS AND DISCUSSIONS .......................................................................................... 162 

8.1  INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................... 162 

8.2  MARKET, GROWING NEEDS IN SCHOOL INVOLVEMENT AND THE WEAK FORMAL LINKAGE BETWEEN FAMILYAND SCHOOL ................................................................................................................................ 162 

8.3  SOCIAL STRATIFICATION, GUANXI EXCLUSION AND CAPITAL CONVERSION ......................................... 166 8.4  INEQUALITY IN SOCIAL CAPITAL AND ITS CONSEQUENCE ............................................................... 169 

BIBLIOGGRAPHY ..................................................................................................................... 172 

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1.1: Expansion of the Chinese higher education system 2 

Figure 1.2: Ratio (%) of rural Students in the top two universities 5 

Figure 1.3: Ratio of beichulv from different social backgrounds in different types of HEIs

8 

Figure 2.1: Rural labor involved in agricultural sector 16  

Figure 2.2: Rural families‟ net income 18 

Figure 2.3: Gini coefficient in rural China 21 

Figure 2.4: Inequality of incomes in rural China 22

Figure 2.5: Per capita income for the rural in the east, central and west 22 

Figure 2.6: Ration of rural primary schools to those in cities and townships 25 

Figure 2.7: Ration of rural junior secondary schools to those in cities and townships 25 

Figure 2.8: Number of rural primary, junior secondary and senior secondary schools 26  

Figure 2.9: Number of students enrolled in rural primary, junior secondary and seniorsecondary schools 26  

Figure 2.10: Number of students‟ transitional rate at national level 27  

Figure 3.1: theoretical framework 70 

Figure 4.1: General Economy of Zong County 75 

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1.1: A typology of researching into college access 4 

Table 2.1: Rural families‟ net income 19 

Table 3.1: Parental involvement with definition 39 

Table 3.2: Social capital and its uses by different authors 52 

Table 4.1: Employment and income gap in Zong County 76  

Table 4.2: School profiles 81 

Table 4.3: Interviewees in the field 82 

Table 4.4: Family profiles 84 

Table 4.5: Households and their children 85 

Table 4.6: Teachers and principals 86  

Table 4.7: Documents at different Level with examples 87  

Table 5.1: Student enrollment in primary and secondary schools of Zong 96  

Table 5.2: School transition rates in Zong and a comparison with the national level (2007)

96  

Table 5.3: Central school and ordinary rural school, with reference to the statistics at

national level 98 

Table 5.4: The transitional rate for three types of senior secondary school 99 

Table 5.5: Plan Enrolled Students and Out of Plan Enrolled Students in Zong 99 

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

APN Academic Performance Notice

CCP Chinese Communist Party

IPES Plan Enrolled Students

MOE Ministry Of Education

OPES Out of Plan Enrolled Students

SCS School Chosen Students

SHSAE Senior Secondary School Admission

Examination

RDICASS Rural Development Institute of Chinese

Academy of Social Science

TVEs Township and Village Enterprises

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I want to thank my parents, Xie Linfeng and Zhang Shou feng for their support

over the years. I am especially grateful for those helps provided by my

 parents-in-law, Guang Shanlin and Ruan Jianping. They took care of my daughter

when I was in the field and preoccupied by the academic writings. Lastly, I wish

to thank my wife, Guang Tingting, and daughter, Xie Xiangyi. They put up with

my frequent absences required to complete the fieldwork and write the thesis.

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 providers.  Minbangaoxiao (民办高校) also gained momentous development in

recent years and provided more places for secondary school graduates (Tao &

Wang, 2010).

Introducing the user-charge principle and encouraging private institutions in the

Chinese higher educational sector, told but only part of the story brought by the

market reforms. Postiglione (2006) has indicated that the momentous change from

a planned to market economy brought significant reforms to China‟s higher

education system. Market, instead of plan, is reconsidered the key mechanism to

allocate resources and revive and promote competitions among different HEIs

(Yan & White, 1994). Decentralization is supposed to be a strategic way of

enforcing marketizing and adjusting institutional governance (Mok, 1999).

Canceling guaranteed job placement for graduates and introduction of labor

markets are a significant step in rebuilding the producer and customer relationship

 between institutions and students (Duan, 2003; Huang, 2005; Postiglione & Xie,

2009).

The current system has been characterized this way:

Education becomes a commodity provided by competitivesuppliers; educational services are priced and access to them

depends on consumer calculation and ability to pay (Yan &

White, 1994).

Therefore, there is a need to consider the impact of market forces on equality of in

access to colleges and universities. As the way of how higher education is funded

has changed, the financial burden has shifted from the state to the individual

student and their family, which may frustrate the educational expectation of those

who cannot afford the cost of college. The withdrawal of the universal student

maintenance grant, replaced by loans (and tuition fees), may also place a number

of new financial burdens on both current and potential students. Canceling

guaranteed job placement for graduates and introduction of a competitive labor

market may even lower the benefits of higher education for poor families and

hamper the willingness of poor parents to invest in higher learning(Y. Liu &

Zhang, 2007).

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An alternative way to ask this is: who suffers and who is advantaged by the

market driven access to college and university, and why?

1.2.2  Who goes to colleges and universities and why?

As college education becomes an important credential with which individuals can

compete for better jobs in the labor market and higher social status in society, the

 body of literature researching college access also rapidly grew. The majority of

newly enrolled college and university ( Putonggaoxiao普通高校) students are

recent secondary school graduates. Numerous studies have been done to examine

who among these graduates are advantaged in college access and why.

According to the units of analysis, this literature can be categorized into two

types. Babbie (2007) claims that the unit of analysis is the major entity being

analyzed in a study and posits that it could be individuals, groups, organizations

and social artifacts. Riordan (1997, p. 64) suggests two units of analysis for

analyzing studies in the sociology of education: individual, and groups or

organization, with the former being the characteristics of individuals such as

socio-economic status and gender, and the latter being characteristics of groups or

organizations such as the contextual environment of communities. The studies of

college access, according to the unit of analysis, can be categorized as follows

(see table 1.1).

Table 1.1: A typology of researching into college access

Units of analysis  Variable used 

Individuals  SES, gender,

Groups ororganizations  Urban and rural, east and west, ethnicity community, 

The first type of research looks at those characteristics of groups and

organizations and claims that such group-level variables such as geographic

locations and ethnicity are important predictors of who can gain access to colleges

and universities and why.

From studying the urban and rural gap in college access, researchers found

children whose parents are residents of east and urban areas are more likely to

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enroll in colleges and universities (X. Y. Chen & Min, 1999; W. Wang & Xie,

2006; Zhong & Lu, 2003). Through comparing matriculating rates of urban and

rural residents, Wei and his colleague reported that urban students‟ matriculating

rates of going to HEIs were three times that of rural students (H. Wei & Yang,

2004). Urban students were not only more likely to enroll in ordinary HEIs, but

also showed more interest in attending selective universities located in eastern and

urban regions. On the contrary, their counterparts from western and rural areas

were meaningfully disadvantaged in going to any type of college and university

(Zhong & Lu, 2003). Moreover, they also tended to choose HEIs located in the

western and middle parts of China and enrolled in disciplines like education and

agricultural studies. Yang (2006b) claimed that a possible explanation for the

choice might be that the living costs in West and Central China are much lower.

Some students could even be exempt from tuition fees and receive subsidies from

the government if they enrolled in programs in teacher education and agricultural

studies (Yang, 2006b).

Figure 1.2: Ratio (%) of Rural Students in Top Two Universities

Source: Wei, H. (2004). “Woguo chengxiang gaodengjiaoyu jihui jundeng de shizheng yanjiu”(A empirical study on the college access gap between urban and rural China). Unpublished MPhil thesis, Beijing Normal University, Beijing.

The privileges of urban residents in gaining access to college were evident even

 before the market reforms. It increased despite the overall expansion of the higher

education system. According to Wei (2004), the percentage of rural college

students in top HEIs substantially decreased from 1994 to 1997 (see figure 1.2).

0

5

10

15

20

25

199119921993199419951996199719981999

Tsinghua University

Peking University

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His research is supported by several later studies. For example, Jiang (2007)

reported in his survey that the number of rural students was becoming less in

those most selective universities in two provinces of China: Jiangxi and Tianjin.

These urban and rural gap studies contribute much of the advantages of urban

students in college access to the quality of schooling they are born to have. They

maintain that schools in eastern and urban areas tend to be equipped with better

educational facilities with more qualified teachers, professional counselors and

even post-secondary preparatory courses. Urban students are then more likely to

have access to these resources and gain privileges in attending colleges and

universities (Yuan, 1999).

Researchers claim that college enrolment rates also remain low for most ethnic

minority groups in China except for Korea, Manchuria, and Mongolia (Gao, 2008,

 p. 43). In most cases, success or failures of minority students are attributed to the

cultural and historical traits of their communities and relevant state policies (Gao,

2008; Yi, 2008; Z. Zhao, 2007). For example, the over-representation of some

ethnic groups in HEIs is claimed to be from their shared senses of cultural

superiority and educational expectation (Gao, 2008). Meanwhile, the low

academic achievement of other ethnic groups is credited to a backward cultural

legacy or the cultural exclusion from the Han-dominated school system that

downplays the cultural legacy of ethnic minority groups and excludes ethnic

minorities from equal access to different schools (Yi, 2008).

While the discourse of urban-rural gap and community forces raises researchers‟

interests in group-level explanations for school success and failures, the market

reforms and emerging types of social stratification of Chinese society draw much

attention of researchers to the individual-level analysis. Researchers report that

individual-level variables such as social economic status and gender are important

 predictors of the unequal access to HEIs (W. Li, 2003; X. Zhou, 2004).

Zhou (2004), for example, found that students from cadre families (Ganbu jiating 

干部家庭)were privileged in college access. His findings are proved in other

similar studies. Li, in his research into social backgrounds of new entrants in

Peking Universities, found that the number of students from cadre families

increased substantially, accompanied by a slight expansion of student population

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from professional backgrounds ( Zhuanye jishu renyuan 专业技术人员) and a

noticeable decrease in the percentage of students from worker and peasant

families ( Putong gongren yu nongmin普通工人与农民)(W. Li,2003). Children

from worker and peasant families are not only under-represented in such prestigious HEIs as Peking University, but are also reported to be disadvantaged

in accessing ordinary HEIs (Yang, 2006b). Their counterparts from those families

of emerging economic elites [including household business owner and individual

industrialist and commercialist (Geti gongshang hu   个体工商户 , private

entrepreneurs (Siying qiyezhu   私营企业主 )]who achieved great success in

accumulating wealth in the market transition, however, gain substantial

advantages in attending all types of colleges and universities. Similar surveys

were conducted by other researchers, which yielded similar findings (W. Wang &

Xie, 2006; Yao, Huang, & Lu, 2006).

Sound chances of students from advantaged social groups (cadres, professionals,

managers, household business owners and individual industrialists and

commercialists, entrepreneurs) in going to HEIs are claimed to be partly the result

of higher family incomes and more investments in education since which may

increase parents‟ privileged position to buy their children comfortable housing,

good nutrition and access to intellectual stimuli; even purchasing high quality

education, private counselor services and extra-curricular training (Yao, et al.,

2006). Yet, their counterparts from disadvantaged social groups were more easily

daunted by high tuition fees for higher education and more likely to choose to

drop out of schools since the perceived cost surpassed potential benefits of an

unpromising higher education diploma (Y. Liu & Zhang, 2007).

Researchers also contributed the advantages that students from those privileged

social groups have in college access to their parents‟ education. Zhao (2000) and

Wang (2005a), for example, found in their research that parents' education level

well predicts their children‟s opportunities in going to colleges and universities.

Other researchers (W. Wang & Xie, 2006; Yao, et al., 2006) also maintain that

students whose fathers are secondary school or college graduates enjoy substantial

advantages in college access, in going to selective colleges and universities in

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 particular. Wang and his colleague (2006) claim a similar influence from their

mothers‟ education on students‟ chances of college access.

Figure 1.3: the ratio of beichulv from different social backgrounds in different types

of HEIs

Note:  beichulv (辈出率) refers to the ratio of enrolled college students from certainsocial strata to the population of the strata.

Source : Wang, W., &Xie, Z. (2006). Research into The Higher Education Opportunitiesof Different Social Classes in China(Zhongguobutongshehuijiecengzinvgaodengjiaoyuruxuejihuichayiyanjiu). Higher Education Research (GaodengJiaoyuyanjiu, 27 (10), 35. 

Gender is also an important factor in differentiating higher education

opportunities. Researchers consistently point out that the number of female

students in undergraduate study and postgraduate study is less than males (C. Li,

2010; X. Wang, 1999). Female students are also found to be more likely to go to

less selective colleges and universities (Z. Xie, Wang, & Chen, 2008). They are

also reported to be more likely than their male counterparts to enroll in programs

in humanity and social sciences. For female students from rural areas, the

situation is more desperate. Yang (2006c) reported that the chances of female

students from rural areas in going to HEIs are even lower than that of their

disadvantaged counterparts from urban areas.

national keyHEIs

ordinaryHEIs

 publichHTVHE

PrivateHTVHE

IndependentHEIs

umemployed people in cities andvilages

 peasants

workers

staff in business

household business owners andindividual industrialists and

commercialists

clerk 

 professionals

Enterpreneurs

Managers

Cadres

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1.3  Rationale of this study

The rapid expansion of Chinese higher education since the 1990s and the

introduction of market forces are having a pronounced effect on the social and

cultural composition of the college and university population. Studies mentioned

above tell us there are gaps in college access between residents from the urban

and rural areas, male and female students, Han and ethnic minority groups and

among social groups from different SES backgrounds. The group-level variables

such as quality of schooling, cultural legacy and individual-level variables such as

family incomes, educational investment and parents‟ education level are often the

explanations for these gaps.

While contributing much to understanding the emerging higher education

opportunity structure in China‟ transition from a planed to the market system, the

literature talks less about the process of how this structure came into being and the

influence of market reform over this process. Still less is known about how the

group differences in college access are formed despite the impressive and

abundant discussions over the college access gap between urban and rural

residents in recent literature and the inequality and equity in success at school.

Although researchers indicate the market reinforced advantaged positions of

cadres, professionals and those new arising economic elites (including private

entrepreneurs, household business owners and individual industrialists and

commercialists) in college access, there is still a lack of research of how market

forces contribute to this process and especially how children from these social

groups gain advantages over their counterparts from peasant families despite

 being only a small proportion of the rural population (X. Lu, 2002).

Most current discourses in disadvantages of students from rural families in college

access research are limited to urban and rural comparisons where the quality of

schooling is seen as the main determinant for rural students‟ higher education

opportunities. While the quality of schooling may be a good explanation for the

college access gap between rural students from east and west areas, it contributes

little in understanding inequality in higher education opportunities among those

rural residents from different social backgrounds who live in similar regions and

the same rural school systems. Strategies of how families from different social

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 backgrounds compete for the privileges of college access for their children are

still in a black box.

Studies referred above also raise the issue of status competition and suggest that

economic and cultural resources are important predictors of rural students‟ college

access. While acknowledging families‟ positions in the stratified rural social

systems and its possible influences over rural student college access, this

explanation considers less about the process of how different families pass their

advantages on to their children and help them to achieve success at school.

Parental involvement has long been seen as the process dimension of families‟

influences over children‟s school success (Y. Jiang, 2003). It refers to activities of

 parents linked to children‟s  learning which could be home, school or

community-based (C Desforges & A Abouchaar, 2003; Epstein, 2001; Schneider

& Coleman, 1993). Lareau (1987)claims parental involvement as a crucial

moment of educational inclusion and exclusion and argues  that the interaction

 between students, parents and teachers provide important occasions where

students may gain privileges such as information, supervising and encouragement

that are conducive to school success. Despite the overall importance of parental

involvement in schooling and its possible significance in explaining school

success of children from different social groups, there are few studies that focus

on how different parents within China‟s rural society get involved in schooling,

how social backgrounds influences the process of parental involvement, and how

this contributes to or become a barrier to their children‟s college access.

1.4  Research problem

China‟s transition to a market system saw the growing importance of human

capital in status achievement and the increasing returns for investment in

education (Debrauw& Rozelle, 2007; W. Zhao & Zhou, 2007). Yet, schooling

does not pay off at the same rate for parents and students from different social

 backgrounds (Yang, 2006b). It is notable that rural students from families of the

cadre, professional and new arising economic elite are gaining an advantage over

their counterparts from peasant families in college access. This study aims at

understanding this advantage. Specifically:

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How do rural parents from different social categories involve

themselves in their children‟s learning process and how this

contributes to their children‟s success or failure in college access?

To be more specific:

1. 

How do rural parents from different social backgrounds perceive

their roles in their children‟s learning process?

2.  What are those strategies that rural parents from different social

 backgrounds use to fulfill their perceived roles?

3. 

What are the advantages and disadvantages in college access

 produced by these different strategies?

1.5  The definition of terms

In the context of this study, key concepts are defined as follows:

Urban and Rural population

According to the National Bureau of Statistics of China, urban and rural

 population could be differentiated according to the administrative system,

 permanent residence or statistical classification. In this study, these two groups of

 people will be defined according to their permanent residence.

Urban Population refers to total population of districts under the

 jurisdiction of a city with district establishment, the population

of street committees under the jurisdiction of a city without

district establishment, population of resident-committees of

towns under the jurisdiction of a city without district

establishment, and the of resident-committees of towns under

the jurisdiction of a county (National Bureau of Statistics of

China, 2002).

Rural Population refers to total population except urban

 population (National Bureau of Statistics of China, 2002).

In the county where this study was carried out, there are mainly three kinds ofresidence: county township (chengguanzhen城关镇), townships ( xiang 乡) and

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villages (cun村). The rural population in this study mainly concerns those who

live in townships and villages.

The pri vileged fami li es

The privileged families in this study refer to those of the cadres, professionals and

the new economic elites‟ backgrounds. The economic elites mainly refer to those

 private entrepreneurs, household business owners and individual industrialists and

commercialists who gained economic success in the China‟s transition to   the

market system.

1.6  The significance of this study

China‟s market reform and its influences over rural residents‟ higher education

opportunities have drawn much attention from researchers in the educational and

sociological research field (C. Li, 2006; J. Liu, 2004; Z. Xie & Luo, 2004; 2006c;

X. Zhou, 2004). This research for the first time reveals there is a need to

understand group differences in college access within rural society and argues that

understanding the process of how cadres, professionals and those economic elites

gain advantages for their children in college access helps to re-evaluate the

influence of market reforms over education systems.

This study also contributes to literature on parental involvement and social class.

While traditionally the definition of parental involvement was seen as

non-negotiable concept, this study proposes that there is a need to understand the

 parental concept of what is involvement in school such as the role they should

take in their children‟s learning process and what constitutes effective strategies in

involvement. The in-depth description of these helps in understanding thosecultural and contextual factors shaping parental involvement in schooling.

Furthermore, the portrait of those strategies used by parents from different

 backgrounds can provide important insights of how social actions of individuals

can help reproduce their class disadvantages and advantages in a special social

and cultural context.

One key policy implication of this study is that once advantages and

disadvantages of parents from different social backgrounds in involving their

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children's learning process are known, more specific policies can be produced to

encourage them to involve in schooling, equally, actively and effectively. Actions

could also be taken to assist different parents to participate in schooling and help

their children to achieve success in school.

1.7  Structure of the dissertation

This dissertation has eight chapters. Chapter one briefly introduces the

 backgrounds, rationales, research problem, terms and significance of this study.

Chapter two focuses on the emerging types of social stratification and changing

landscape of education system in rural China in this market transition era with the

aim of providing a context to understand this research.

Chapter three reviews the literature. It necessitates those key concepts in

understanding college access for rural students and inequality, provides a

theoretical framework for understanding the social class, its influence over rural

 parents‟ involvement in schooling and their implications  over inequality in

college access.

Chapter four describes the methodology of this study. Beginning with adiscussion of the rationale of why ethnographic approach is used in this study, it

then briefly justifies the selection of the field. Access and methods in data

collection and analysis is then introduced.

Chapter five, six and seven present the main findings of this study. Chapter five

examines parent perceptions of their role in schooling, teacher attitudes to

 parents‟ participation in schools and schools‟ arrangements in getting parents

involved in schools. Chapter six examines the strategies of parents from different

social backgrounds in school involvement. Chapter seven reports the intended and

unintended consequence of parental involvement in schooling.

Chapter eight summarizes and discusses the research findings. It returns to the

theoretical framework of this study and discusses the theoretical and practical

implication of this study.

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CHAPTER TWO

Market, Rural Society and Education in Transition

2.1  Introduction

Chinese rural society has experienced two extraordinary transformations since the

end of 1940s, which were initiated by Mao and Deng respectively. While the first

transformation featured the rapid overturns of political institutions and the land

tenure system, the second one saw the reverse of most of the policies under the

radical era (Unger, 2002). This chapter is primarily concerned with the most

important transition process at the latter period in rural society: privatization and

marketization; both of which have provided important references for

understanding the increasing inequality and emerging social stratification in rural

China. It then briefly introduces some important changes in rural education

system since 1970s. Finally, some challenges facing rural schools are also

discussed. All of these attempts contextualize the research problem into the socialand historical backgrounds of China‟s market transitional era.  

2.2  Market transition, Rural Society and Its Transformation

2.2.1  Market reforms and rural economy

Chinese incremental transition from a planned to market system, has left a large

imprint in its history and in rural society (Waldron, Brown, & Longworth, 2003,

 p. 21). During the socialist era, China‟s countryside was highly collective with

agricultural production within each village held in the hands of production teams

(Shengchandui生产队). What peasants produced had to be sold to the government

 procurement stations at fixed prices (Y. Lin, 1992). Furthermore, peasants were

constrained from being involved in private trade or producing handicraft. They

were also deprived of the right to leave farming and immigrating to cities to gain

industrial work (Davis & Wang, 2009). The market reforms in post-socialist

China, however, saw changes in most of these policies and the reorganization of

the peasants‟ lives and livelihoods (Unger, 2002, p. 95).

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The rural transition began with the introduction of the Household Responsibility

System (HRS, Jiatinglianchanchengbaozerenzhi家庭联产承包责任制). The HRS

system was first an experiment and launched at the end of 1970s in both

impoverished inland provinces and regions specializing in cash crops such as

cotton (Cai, Wang, & Du, 2008; Y. Lin, 1992). With success in linking the returns

with production and the incentives with output, the Chinese Communist Party

(CCP) tried to extend the reform to more areas and popularize the system in the

whole agricultural sector (Du, 2010). At the end of 1984, after CCP legitimized

the HRS as a new form of basic unit of production, distribution, and consumption

in rural areas by endorsing it in the CCP‟ Central Committee‟s No. 1 Document

for 1982 (namely the conference summary (Quanguonongcungongzuohuiyijiyao 

1982年全国农村工作会议纪要), more than 98 percent of rural households were

involved in the new system (L. Wei, 2009). Through HRS, collective agriculture

was eventually abandoned and the land divided into family plots (Nee, 1996).

Although farm households had not actually possessed the full ownership of their

allocated land whose title was still in the name of the village. They were, for the

first time since the establishment of collectivist agriculture in China, allowed to

lease collective-owned land on family base and sell their product (Nee, 1996;

Unger, 2002). This shift from a collective system to a system where households

had decision-making powers and control over the land and other resources, they

used finally witnessed the once deprived property rights being returned to

individual families again (Nee, 1991; Oi, 1989).

Beyond HRS, additional steps were also taken to reform the mandatory quota

 procurement system. The market system was gradually introduced into the

 process of selling and buying grains (Jeffries, 2006). Through a series of distinct

 but closely related phases, the government gradually discarded the substantial

subsidy on urban grain supply and most of the control of grain marketing

(Garnaut & Guonan, 1996). The gradual removal of the control over demand and

supply of grains granted peasants the right to decide what to produce and how to

market their product (Tang, 1996). Re-establishing market mechanisms in trading

rural products urged  peasants to improve the efficiency in the using of family‟s

labor power since the proper use of this labor power was again directly linked

with the beneficiaries of their families (Unger, 2002).

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Families with spare labor began to use more land for planting labor-intensive,

high-priced commercial crops (Du, 2010; Unger, 2002; Y. Zhou, 2009). They also

used more time to grow animals with the aim of diversifying and increasing their

incomes. Moreover, peasants began to earn a sound part of their livings outside of

agriculture. With the reduction of demand for farm labor brought by technological

innovation and increased inputs of capital, families with a surplus labor force, for

example, became highly involved in non-agricultural sectors. Some of these

families even left villages for long periods to work at the richer locations of rural

areas, urban factories in the east coastal areas, urban construction sites or for other

 pursuits (Nyberg & Rozelle, 1999). The number of rural residents who were

directly involved in the agricultural sector has been decreasing steadily since

1978. For example, in 1978, more than 90 percent of rural laborers were still in

the agricultural sectors of its economy, while in 2009, the number declined to

around 60 percent (see figure 2.1).

Figure 2.1: Rural labor involved in the agricultural sector

Sources:   National Bureau of Statistics of China. (2009). China statistical yearbooks,2009 Beijing: China Statistics Press.

With the impact of market reforms becoming more and more profound in rural

villages, the free circulation of labor, commodities and funds has led to a dramatic

increase of township and village enterprises (TVEs) and the rise of private

enterprises. Most TVEs were established during the 1980s, collectively owned in

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

197819801985199019952000200520062009

"rural labor involved in

agricultural sector"

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the sense that they were sponsored by township and village governments, and

soon became one of the most booming segments of the Chinese economy (Cai, et

al., 2008). At its height, TVEs contributed more than 40 percent of the national

gross industrial output and employed around 130 million workers (Y. Zhou,

2009). Even though soon left-behind by the restructured state-owned enterprise

and emerging private enterprises after 1990s, they were still important entities that

 provided large number of off-farm employment to rural labor. For example, in

2009, TVEs employed over 155 million rural labors, equivalent to one quarter of

the rural labor population (National Bureau of Statistics of China, 2009). The

1990s also saw the blooming of private enterprises in rural areas with the

encouragement from the central and local governments, the process of which was

accelerated when many TVEs were finally sold to private owners (Nyberg

&Rozelle, 1999; Unger, 2002).

2.2.2  Wealth, poverty and inequality

The market transition saw two decades of economic growth in China with its real

 per capita GDP increasing by 9 percent per year for over 30 years. The continuous

economic growth created chances to accumulate wealth for the first time since

the1950s. Meanwhile, the government also began to launch favorable policies insupport of the rural population and all these policies contributed to the increase of

rural incomes. For example, it began to exempt peasants from agricultural tax

since 2007(RDICASS, 2007). Substantial subsidies were also provided to

 peasants for their agricultural production and the increased agricultural

 procurement prices. A new Rural Cooperative Medical System focusing on

inpatient-care was also established to reduce the costs peasants have when they go

to hospital and to improve the quality of the medical service they receive

(RDICASS, 2007).

In the socialist era, rural households had few chances to generate income and

accumulate wealth. Most were confined to villages and the major part of their

income was earned from farming. For example, in 1978 when market reforms

 began, rural residents earned over 85 percent of their incomes from the

agricultural sector. The majority could accumulate little wealth from this since

most of their products had to be sold at a low price to the state to provide urban

dwellers with sufficient food (Y. Lin, 1992).

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 Now after decades of reforms, families in rural areas have begun to substantially

 profit by selling what they have produced. What peasants earned from farming

has increased rapidly with improvements in both agricultural productivity and

agricultural prices. From 1990 to 2009, for example, per capita net income earned

from the agricultural sector by peasants increased from less than 500 RMB to

around 2，000 RMB (see figure 2.2). Moreover, peasants began to earn a

substantial part of their income outside the agricultural sector. In 1990, for

example, over half of peasants‟ incomes were from farming. When it came to

2010, however, more than 60 percent of peasants‟ incomes were from off -farm

endeavors and other sources.

Figure 2.2: Rural families’ net income 

Sources:  National Bureau of Statistics of China. (2009). China rural statistical

 yearbooks, 2009. Beijing: China Statistics Press. 

The increased portion of these off-farm incomes came from employment in local

TVEs and various private enterprises. Another substantial part was from labor

markets in cities. According to the annual report from the Rural Development

Institute at Chinese Social Science Academy (RDICSSA), the incomes of rural

households from immigrant work grew steadily over the past 30 years. With the

shortage of immigrant workers in many eastern and coastal areas in recent years,

rural households earned even more from their immigrant employment. For

example, the monthly salary for a migrant worker was 781 RMB in 2003, which

0

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

1978 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2009

"net income from

agricultural sector"

total net income

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increased to 953 RMB in 2006 with a yearly increase at a rate of 22 percent (Ru,

Lu, & Li, 2006). Generally speaking, for all who went to work in cities, over 60

 percent could earn more than 600 RMB per month. More than a quarter could

earn over 1,000 RMB a month (see table 2.1).

Table 2.1: Rural families’ net income 

Monthly

wages RMB 2003  2004  2005  2006 

Below 200  6.4  5.2  3.7  2.7 

200-400  21.6  19.3  1.5  11 

400-600  28.9  28.7  27.2  22.8 

600-800  16.4  17.4  19.3  20.4 

800-1000  11.2  12.4  15.1  17.2 

1000－1200  5.4  6  7  9.1 

1200-1400  2.3  2.5  3  4.2 

1400-1600  2  2.5  3.1  3.9 

Above 1600  5.9  6.1  6.6  8.7 

Source: Ru, X., Lu, X., & Li, P. (2006). The China society yearbook: analysis and forecast of China's social development, 2006 . Leiden: Brill. 

In spite of rapid economic growth and continual accumulation of wealth, poverty

 persists in rural areas, especially in remote rural areas. The ratio of the rural

 population living in extreme destitution decreased substantially during the reform

era; dropping from over 14 percent in 1987 to less than 2 percent in 2007.

 Nevertheless the absolute number of rural residents in poverty is still large (Y.

Zhou, 2009). In 2004, for example, there were still more than 2,500 million ruralresidents earning less than 700 RMB per year. In 2007, the number of rural

residents with a per capital income below 800 RMB per year was still around

1,500 million RMB (Zhang, 2008). Considering the number of those near-poor

whose per capita income is above the poverty threshold ( 944 RMB per year), the

number of rural people who still live in critical situations trebled to more than

6,400 million (Zhang, 2008). Rural residents in poverty are concentrated in the

middle and west part of China. For example, using a government definition of

 poverty as a per capita income of less than 785 RMB per year in 2007, the number

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of rural residents in poverty was 1.41 million in the east, 4.61 million in the

middle and 8.78 million in the west (Zhang, 2008). This indicates that over 90

 percent rural population in poverty occupies the middle and western parts of the

country. Most of these people and their children live in impoverished mountain

areas and cannot get access to high quality education and health care. Many went

into poverty because of the high cost of sending their children to schools and

 paying the high medical charges in the fee-for service health care system (Davis

& Wang, 2009).

The above story about wealth and poverty reveals a simple fact about the market

reform: some are taking the lead, while others are left-behind. Prior to market

reforms, the inequality in rural society was relatively inconspicuous as most of the

rural sector earning the same as each other. However, with significant changes in

household income structure and the rapid development of ex-farm opportunities,

the overall income inequality increased steadily during the post-socialist era.

Using the Gini coefficient as a measure of income distribution, the inequality

within rural areas increased significantly with a value around 0.2 to nearly 0.4

from 1978 to 2006 (see figure 2.3). As the market reform continues, the aggregate

income distribution becomes highly concentrated towards the top quintiles of the

rural population. In 2007, for example, households in the top quintile had a per

capital income exceeding 9,791 RMB. Households in the middle and fourth

quintiles had per capita incomes between 3,659 RMB and 5,130 RMB. Their

counterparts from the lowest quintile had per capita incomes, however, less than

1,347 RMB (RDICASS, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010). Although the rapid economic

growth has created and continues to create chances for the rural to earn more with

an annual average increase of income at more than 10 percent, the absoluteincrease of income for the lowest and the second quintiles is still slow (Zhang,

2008) (see figure 2.4). Income inequality also exists at the regional level. The

China Yearbook of Rural Household Survey (1992, 2000, 2005, 2007, 2010)

shows the east coastal areas continue to run ahead of the central and western

regions and regional inequality in terms of per capita income for the rural among

these regions has become more and more evident since the 1980s (see figure 2.5).

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Figure 2.3: Gini coefficient in rural China

Source: Zhang, D. (2008). " Zhongguojumingshourufenpeiniandubaogao, 2008" (Annualreport of Chinese's residents' distribution of incomes, 2008). Beijing: Economic SciencePress.

The changed path to economic prosperity and the enlarging income gap recall the

issue of class formation (Davis & Wang, 2009). In the socialist era,

 bureaucratically assigned class labels heavily determined the social and political

statuses of individuals and created a social structure stratified by differences not

in wealth but in political loyalty (Davis & Wang, 2009). With the market reforms,

however, these class labels and commissural social stratification that lasted more

than twenty years vanished away (Davis & Wang, 2009; Unger, 2002).

0

0.05

0.1

0.15

0.2

0.25

0.3

0.35

0.4

0.45

Gini Coefficient

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in post socialist era. Research indicates that rural cadres gain control and income

rights over collective industry, exerted their influence over salaried positions for

family members in TVEs, capitalized on influence networks and information with

 private entrepreneurs, and even started “insider privatization” to  plunder

collective assets (Bian & Logan, 1996; N. Lin, 1995; X. Liu, 2009). Therefore,

they have achieved substantial advantages in accumulating wealth in post socialist

era.

The second element standing out refers to the phenomenon that the market reform

resulting in new opportunity structures centering on the marketplace has given

rise to entrepreneurship. Increasing returns to capital saw the emergence of new

economic elites in rural society: the household business owners and private

entrepreneurs. Some are cadres, or relatives and friends of cadres, who

transformed their political power into sources of private incomes. Some gain their

advantages through their own skills and resources (Unger, 2002). The third

element is the return to education increased and the professionals gained also

advantages because of the knowledge and skills they have acquired (Bian, 2002a;

X. Lu, 2002, 2004).

2.3  Rural Schooling and children in the Transitional Era

2.3.1  The changing landscape of rural education

Most rural schools are primary and secondary, although the school system in rural

areas are diversified and there are also increasing numbers of preschool

institutions, technical and vocational schools, as well as HEIs in these areas. For

most of the time after 1978, rural schools have taken up a large proportion of the

Chinese education system. For example, in most of the cases since 1978, morethan 80 percent of primary schools and over 50 percent of junior secondary

schools are rural ones (see figure 2.6, 2.7 and 2.8). Rural schools also provide

education for the majority of students in China‟s  school system. For as long as

nearly 20 years after 1978, over 50 percent of Chinese students have received

their primary education in rural schools and this number decreased only recently

with the decreasing of the rural student population and consolidation of rural

schools (see figure 2.9)(Yang, 2010). The student population in rural schoolsserved were over 120 million since 1978 which decreased recently because of the

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large-scale immigration of rural residents to urban areas and the a substantial

decrease in the number of school-aged children with the implementation of the

county‟s one child policy. 

Market reform also saw great changes within this huge school system. During the

socialist era, many radical educational policies were implemented and great

efforts were made, especially in the Cultural Revolution era, to eliminate social

differences in school systems both in terms of class origins and urban-rural

locations (Hannum, 1999; X. Zhou, 2004). For example, the merit-based criteria

in selecting students were abolished and political recommendations and class

labels became the primary means of determining progress in schooling (Unger,

1982). Tracking systems were also abolished, as well as key schools, vocational

education system (Rosen 1984). The link between education and occupational

achievement was also removed (Unger, 1982).

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Figure 2.8: The number of rural primary, junior secondary and senior

secondary schools

Sources:  National Bureau of Statistics of China. (2009). China rural statistical yearbooks, 2009. Beijing: China Statistics Press. 

Figure 2.9: The number of students enrolled in rural primary, junior

secondary and senior secondary schools

Sources:  National Bureau of Statistics of China. (2009). China rural statistical

 yearbooks, 2009.Beijing: China Statistics Press. 

The post-socialist era witnessed the overturn of most of these policies and schools

were reconstructed to satisfy the needs of economic reconstruction (Pepper, 1990;

Thøgersen, 1990). Education was thought to be the key to science and technology,

and the means for sustainable economic growth (Pepper, 1990). Many efforts,

0

200000

400000

600000

800000

1000000

1200000

1978 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2006 2009

the number of rural senior

secondary schools

the number of rural junior

secondary schools

the number of rural primary

schools

0

20000

40000

60000

80000

100000

120000

140000

160000

180000

200000

1978 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2006 2009

number of students enrolled

in rural senior secondary

schools

number of students enrolled

in rural junior secondary

schools

number of students enrolled

in rural primary schools

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 provincial governments in funding compulsory education. As a result, the central

government compulsory education budgets increased rapidly (Yang, 2010). In

2008, for example, Chinese central governments had a budget of 66.6 billion

RMB for rural compulsory education (Yang, 2009). Expenditures for rural

compulsory education were also fully merged into the central and local

government budgets. A mechanism was also established to guarantee funding for

rural compulsory education through combining the allocations from the central

and local governments (Lou & Ross, 2008; Yang, 2010).

Efforts have also been made to improve the quality of rural education to a

standard comparable to schools in cities through investing more and better

resources in rural schooling. In  suggestions on Further Promoting the Balanced

 Development of Compulsory Education  issued in May 2005, the MOE, for

example, suggested that special policies would be further initiated to reduce

disparities between rural and urban schools in funding and quality of teachers and

facilities. They required governments at different levels to balance resource

allocations between rural and urban areas and give village and small township

schools and those far less developed than cities, priorities in recruiting new

teachers.

Since 2001, the Chinese government has also initiated The Project for the

Reconstruction of Dilapidated School Buildings in Rural Primary and Secondary

Schools ( Nongcun zhongxiaoxue weifang gaizao gongcheng 农村中小学危房改造

工程) with the aim of improving learning conditions for rural students and

ensuring all rural school buildings are safe in central and western China. Between

the year of 2001 and 2005, over 9 billion RMB have been invested in this project,

where 60,833 ramshackle school buildings were rebuilt (Caing Net, June, 11th,

2011). Chinese government also launched a “special- post” teachers program in

2006 with the aim of providing rural schools, in central and western parts of

China in particular, with more quality teachers with college degrees. Between

2006 and 2009, over 59.2 thousand of college graduates were recruited to this

 program and introduced to rural schools. (China News Net, March 18th, 2009).

Government at provincial level was also required to financially guarantee teachers

in rural primary and junior secondary school could get their salary in reasonable

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time and quantity.

Market reform also saw more links between rural schooling and the labor market.

A competitive entrance examination was introduced again into the education

system so that the most intelligent students could be selected (Hannum, Park, &

Cheng, 2007; Unger, 1982). More rural vocational and technical school were

established or transformed from regular schools. Vocational education centers

were also created in many counties. All of these efforts were made to improve the

alignment between schools and the labor market. Research proved that the

economic returns to education in rural China increase with the market reform

(Debrauw & Rozelle, 2007; Parish, Zhe, & Li, 1995). Education is, for example,

 becoming a crucial factor that decides whether rural laborers are able to find a

 profitable off-farm work successfully (Y. Zhou, 2009).

2.3.2  Challenges to Rural Schooling and Beyond

Rural schools are still facing great challenges today. Most are still weak, get less

investment and are left-behind by urban schools. Although great efforts have been

made to eliminate these financial gaps, the overall inequality in school spending

 between urban and rural schools still exists (Yang, 2010). In terms of per capita

spending on teaching facilities for example, urban primary schools nearly have as

many three times the budget as rural ones. Rural schools are still handicapped

with many teachers of dubious quality. The number of teachers with college

degrees in rural schools is far less than in urban ones. Compared with their

counterparts in urban schools, the number of teachers in rural schools with a

senior professional title is also far fewer than that in urban schools (Yang, 2006a).

Moreover, rural schools are now serving a more diversified student population.

With the booming of China‟s economy, for example, more than 200 million

farmers are moving to cities in search of work (Chan, 2009). Although many

migrant workers take their children to the cities where they work, their children‟s

situation demands further consideration since many will return to rural school

after being away from hometowns for a period. Research estimates 18.34 million

migrant children in cities. Nearly half of the migrant children were from

Guangdong, Anhui, Henan, Sichuan, Hunan, Hubei, Shandong and Jiangsu(Yang, 2008). Over 29.9 percent of these children were born in cities where their

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 parents worked. More than 30 percent of these children have been in cities for

more than five years (Yang, 2008). However, most were denied the full access to

the social welfare system in those cities where their parents worked. For example,

a survey in Dongguan, an industry city in Guangdong, shown that nearly half the

migrant children were not involved in the public medical care system(S. Lu,

2005).

Over 61.3 percent of these migrant children are of school age and most are still

discriminated against by urban schooling (Yang, 2008). Although the central

government claims “host cities are responsible for enrolling the migrant youth in

their public education systems”（Yi liuru di weizhu, yi gongba nxuexiao weizhu 以流入

地为主，以公办学校为主), there is still a substantial body of migrant children

 being denied access to public schools in the cities where their parents work

(Yang, 2008). For example, in 2005,of the 500 thousand migrant children in

Beijing, 38 percent could not attend public schools. In Shanghai, only 50.7

 percent of its migrant children could get access to public schooling in 2006

(Yang, 2008). The situation has significantly improved after a number of cities

such as Shanghai and Dongguan, upon the request of Ministry of Education, tried

to reform its public education system and enroll more migrant children into their

 public education system. Shanghai has promised to send all school-aged migrant

children whose parents working in Shanghai to its public schools in the near

future.

For those migrant children who successfully enrolled in public schools in cities

where their parents work, they still experience the difficulties in identifying

themselves as true members of these schools. Most have a strong sense of

alienation from the urban schools (Chan, 2009; Yang, 2009). A survey shows that

they are still outsiders in some social activities in schools. More than 37 percent

 perceived that the local students did not accept them and nearly 40 percent

claimed that they were to some extent, discriminated against in public schools

(Lei, 2004). The study also found that migrant children performed worse than

their native counterparts in academic performance (Wu, 2009).

For those excluded from quality public schooling and enrolled in Migrants'

Children Schools ( Nongmin gong zidixuexiao 农民工子弟学校), the situation was

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even worse. They usually could not get access to quality schooling. In most cases,

migrant schools run privately and cannot get funds from the government. They

cannot purchase enough quality teaching facilities that are comparable to public

schools (Fan, 2006; Y. Zhu, 2004). The salaries they are able to offer to teachers

are also still low. A recent survey in Beijing showed that most of the teachers in

this type of schools earned less than RMB 1,000 per month. Moreover, 54.1

 percent were paid RMB 600-799 per month and only 8.3 percent were paid above

1,000 RMB per month (S. Zhao, 2000). Low salaries and a lack of a guarantee of

access to social welfare discouraged young college graduates from seeking

employment in these schools. The Beijing survey mentioned above shows that

only 40 percent of teachers in these institutions have a college degree. Nearly half

have only a secondary school or vocational school education (S. Zhao, 2000).

Migrant children enrolled in public schools are sometimes segregated from native

students (Chan, 2009; Zeng & Li, 2007). A recent study in Beijing reported that

40 percent of migrant children did not have native children friends and 33.7

 percent mentioned they did not want to have native students as their friends since

they felt that they were looked down upon by these local students (Lei, 2004).

They could seldom foster a feeling of belonging to the cities where their parents

worked.

Students in these schools were also found to be disadvantaged in achieving

academic success. They were less likely to be supervised by their working parents

and performed worse than their counterparts in public schools (Feng, 2008).

Furthermore, most were denied access to senior secondary schools in cities after

finishing their compulsory education and had to return to their hometowns if they

wanted to take the Senior Secondary School Admission Examination and receive

a senior secondary education (Yang, 2008). Many experienced difficulties in

re-adapting into rural society without the care of their parents (Yang, 2008).

Many migrant workers left their children at home to be taken care of by a single

 parent, grandparents or other relatives because of perceived difficulties in getting

full access to public schools in those cities where they worked. Researchers from

the All-China Women‟s Federation (ACWF) ( Zhonghua quanguo funv lianhe hui

中华全国妇女联合会) estimated that the number of children left-behind has

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reached 58 million, which equals to around 28.3 percent of the rural children‟s

 population. According to research by ACWF, nearly half (47 percent) of these

children were left-behind at home under the care of one parent (usually their

mother). 26 percent were living with their grandparents. About 27 percent were

cared by their relatives or friends of their parents, or without any kind of custody

from adults (ACWF, 2008). In most families, the husband would work in the city

for a few years before his wife joined him. Most of these left-behind children live

in central and west China in such provinces as Sichuan(四川),Anhui（安徽）,

Henan（河南）, Hunan（湖南）,and Jiangxi（江西）(China Youth Daily, May, 29th 

2006). In some rural counties in west and central China, the number of left-behind

children accounts for as much as 80 percent of the child population (ACWF,

2008).

Most of these left-behind children have very limited contact with their parents

who migrate to cities in search of jobs. Research in Changsha of Hunan, shows

that more than 88 percent of left-behind children in Changsha met their migrant

 parents one or two times a year since their parents seldom returned home. 45

 percent have no idea where their parents worked and 75 percent never visited the

cities where their migrant parents worked in (CYLHN, 2006; Lv, 2005). Phone

calls are the main way to maintain the contact between these children and their

migrant parents. A survey in Beijing found that about 80 percent of left-behind

children talked with their parents on the phone once every two weeks (Lv, 2005).

Most of these left-behind children are in great need for emotional support from

their parents and most have experienced psychological distress and get little

 psycho-therapy support (Z. Zhou, Sun, Liu, & Zhou, 2005). Research shows that

left-behind children are more likely than their counterparts in rural areas to suffer

from such psychological diseases as depression and barriers to communicate with

others. For example, a two-year longitudinal research shows 37 percent of the

child left-behind under survey said that they did not want to talk to anyone, 30

 percent said that they always felt lonely (Chan, 2009).

These left-behind children were also more vulnerable than their urban

counterparts to natural disasters, accidents, and crimes (Chan, 2009). Above all,

many left-behind children experienced learning difficulties in schools. They are

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more likely than their city counterparts to drop out of school. They also perform

worse than their counterparts from other backgrounds in rural areas. A recent

survey in a county of Sichuan showed that 48 percent of left-behind children

achieved a very low academic rank in their classes (China Rural Study Net,

 November, 17 th 2004). Most perceived less motivation than their counterparts in

learning. They were also less likely to finish their homework on time (Tan &

Wang, 2004). Their parents and grandparents at home are usually without

education and could not provide them with any help in learning (X. Li, 2004; W.

Liang, 2010).

2.4  Chapter summary

As the economic and social institutions of China continue to evolve, the social

and educational landscapes both within and outside rural society are changing

rapidly. This chapter provides a brief introduction to the market reform in China

and how it changed its path to poverty, wealth and inequality within rural society.

It also generally describes the changing landscape of rural schooling and the most

important challenges it faces. Grasping these continuities and changes within rural

society and its school system presents not only a context for understanding the

research questions under inquiry in this study but a necessary step in seeing the

social space where rural parents act.

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CHAPTER THREE

Literature Review and Theoretical Framework

3.1  Introduction

This chapter will develop a theoretical framework to study parental involvement

in rural schooling and its implication for the inequality in college access for

students from different social backgrounds. It first examines two bodies of

literature, namely, the state and market explanations to the advantages and

disadvantages in college access in China. It highlights the importance of strategies

of how rural parents navigate the rapid changes in rural schooling and help their

children achieve success in school. By focusing on the concept of “parental

involvement”, it then analyzes what specific strategies rural parents can use to

influence their children‟s chances in school and how it is linked to social class.

In what follows, I try to unpack rural parents‟ strategies by invoking Bourdieu‟s

idea of capital conversion. I understand parental involvement in schooling as a

capital process where rural parents transform their advantages in economic and

cultural resources into