AS the head of Shanghai Sipopolytechnic, Pan Jiajun said that he had to accept a lot of pressure. Sipopolytechnic was established as a non-government technical college last year. In the first year in which it was formally approved by the Shanghai Municipal Government to recruit students, its allocated enrollment quota was 400 students.

"Most of the students were those who failed in their high school entrance examinations," Pan said.

He still remembered that only 270 students had registered at the open day last September, although over 1,200 students had eventually signed up.

The period when Sipopolytechnic began its first-year of operation happened to be the very moment that China's Law on the Promotion of Non-government Education came into effect.

According to Article 5, non-government schools and governmental schools had identical legal standing. The autonomy of non-governmental school was guaranteed.

Unfavourable situation

The law was very encouraging for Pan and other people who sought to develop non-government education in China. Previously non-government education had played only a secondary role in the country. it had been seen as merely a complement to the State education system, whose position was completely dominant.

An important privilege of State schools was that they could access funds from the government. By comparison, non-government schools had been hampered in their operations by financial difficulties.

In order to support the sustainable development of Sipopolytechnic, Pan and his colleagues had to seek financial support from a diverse range of sources. "I often have the strong feeling I am creating a business," Pan said.

Apart from financial support, the monopoly status of State education also resulted in advantages when it came to recruiting students.

Due to the long educational history of State schools, combined with the relatively high proportion of their students who went on to enter higher education and also their relatively low tuition fees, parents typically preferred to send their children to such schools.

Compared to State schools, non-government schools had a short history with most being established after the implementation of China's opening-up policy.

Furthermore, their tuition fees were usually higher than those of State schools. "We have no right to decide the tuition fee, since it depends on the decision of the pricing bureau," Pan said.

"On the one hand, we have to consider the cost of operating schools. On the other hand, we can not decide tuition fee ourselves," said Chen Guanlin, the head of the Shanghai Meilong Private Middle School.

Under such circumstances, Pan wondered, who could possibly choose to study in a non-government school?

New education needs

Without much support from the government, non-government education has had to struggle in an unfavourable environment.

Working as a teacher in a non-government school, "Xiao Zhang" (not his real name) argued, meant accepting an inferior status when compared to teachers in State schools.

It was usually hard for such teachers to apply for scientific research projects, for instance, since most of these were allocated to State schools.

In addition, such teachers felt comparatively insecure, because they did not enjoy the same welfare benefits as State school teachers. "I am still disappointed with the Law ... some measures will probably not really be put into effect," Xiao said.

"The less support non-government education gets, the more adverse its situation becomes," said professor Gu Jun of the Sociology Department of Shanghai University.

One direct result of this vicious circle was that many parents remained dubious about the quality of non-government education.

"What non-government education needs from the government is not necessarily financial aid, but rather more freedom to absorb social finance so as to develop themselves in a reasonable and healthy fashion," Gu said.

"To a certain degree, the development of non-government education has a close relationship with the economic structure," said Liu Guoyong, a researcher from the Shanghai Non-government Education Institute, affiliated to the Shanghai Academy of Educational Sciences.

Take East China's Zhejiang Province for example, where both state-owned businesses and non-State-owned businesses developed side by side. Within this diversified economic environment, the province's non-government education also grew up in a diverse way and expanded vigorously.

In Shanghai, however, where the State-owned economy has a stronger effect, non-government education was placed firmly in an inferior position.

Statistics from the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission in 2000 showed that there were 35 non-government primary schools in Shanghai, among which 18 were system transferred schools (State schools which have been transformed into non-government schools under the guidance of the Shanghai Municipal Government).

Way out

Meilong Private Middle School was one such system transferred school. As head of the school, Chen said that he now had more operational autonomy to realize his educational ideas than before. But he was still confused about who really owned the school assets.

For system transferred non-government schools, it was still mysterious whether school assets were public or non-public.

It can not be denied that the development of non-government education in China has been through a difficult period over the past twenty years.

From the implementation of the opening-up policy (beginning in December 1979) until 1992, the discussion of non-government education focused on whether it should be developed at all. At that time, the main income of non-government education came from tuition fees.

Since 1992 until today, the main difficulties confronting non-government education have included uncertain educational quality, shortage of qualified teachers and sources of students. Meanwhile, people began to explore the new investment system and study the management of non-government education.

"The Law in itself is a progressive step," said professor Jin Linxiang from the East China Normal University. For the first time it clearly established the principle that non-government education was not merely a complement of State education. On the contrary, both shared the same status.

When non-government education called for more governmental support, the key questions were how to improve its educational quality and how to increase its recognition by the whole of society. These steps were both crucial to its future development, according to Jin.

On China's way to popularize education among ordinary people, non-governmental education would play an important role. However, it was impractical to always count on the government to invest heavily in education.

The unique advantages that non-government education was endowed with were its superior flexibility and its natural affinity with the market.

"By making use of a diversity of educational investment sources, non-government education should reinforce its emphasis on educational matters and narrow the gap with State education," Chen said.