The development of the education system of the PRC in the government's policy documents (2001–2025)

This study attempts to analyze the specifics of implementing China's state policy in developing its education system. Education occupies a special place in China's modernization program, and its effectiveness is one of the basic conditions for ensuring socio-economic well-being. Education laws adopted in the late 1990s defined the basic framework of implementation of educational policy. On their basis, a number of special programs for developing areas and levels of education have been realized. Five-year plans act as the main program document that defines target indicators of socio-economic development. This article examines the five-year plans from 2001 to 2025 in terms of developing the education system. The author reveals that the main objectives during this period were ensuring accessibility of secondary education, leveling out regional disparities in educational development, and building a system of lifelong education. The 13th and 14th five-year plans pay special attention to expanding educational influence at the international level, and higher education is a special area of modern China's foreign policy. The author notes that over the past two decades, educational policy has become more specific, with goals and objectives being defined for individual sectors and levels of education. Quantitative indicators, primarily the rates of enrollment in education at all levels of education, deserve special attention. At the same time, the country's leadership is aware that the extensive nature of educational development was a necessary stage, but now it is necessary to focus on the quality of education.