DISTRIBUTION & SUPERVISION
As Wen pledged to further increase government expenditures on education and make good use of such funding, experts called for financial reform and enhanced supervision over the use of such funding.
Liu Yichun, president of Northeast Normal University in Jilin Province, said the government should explore more efficient methods for allocating and using educational funds and building long-term safeguarding measures to secure the future growth of such funds.
The government's primary duty in educational service is to provide fair and equal access to basic education, or the nine-year compulsory schooling, according to Dr. Xiong, the education scholar.
However, there are still significant differences between ordinary schools and "key" schools in terms of their shares of governmental funds -- not to mention the urban-rural gap, he wrote.
He further explained that the central government has invested heavily in higher education, but some county-level local governments were unable to allocate adequate funds for rural primary schools or middle schools.
Reform in the distribution system should focus on giving provincial governments more resources and responsibilities in rural school financing, Dr. Xiong suggested.
Education appropriation committees at both the national and local levels should also be set up to supervise the government's input and the use of the funds, he added.
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