Educational aspiration of parents for their children in Urban China

Abstract

The primary objective this study was to determine the educational aspiration of parents for their children in urban China. The respondents of the study consisted of 384 randomly selected parents in the Haidian district of Beijing in China, who were aged 35 and older and had at least one child. This study is descriptive and correlational in nature. It utilized the one-shot survey design. The variables considered in this study were: age, sex, educational attainment, occupational status, family income and number of children of the respondents. To gather the data needed for the study, the researcher used two types of questionnaires, the personal information and a checklist questionnaire. The data were encoded, processed and analyzed by computer using the software, Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 17 program. In consonance with the objectives of the study, it was hypothesized that there is no significant relationship between personal characteristics of parents and their beliefs on the importance of education, furthermore, it was hypothesized that there is no significant relationship between parents’ beliefs on the importance of education and educational aspiration of parents for their children. Summary of Major Findings 1. out of the total respondents, majority of the parents are married, having less than high school education, earning 8001 RMB and above, and belong to the age bracket of 36 to 45 years old, 57.8 percent are males and 42.2 percent are females and majority of them have only one child. 2. majority of the parents want their children to study in public schools, most of the parents also want their children to study in Beijing. All of the parents believe that education is important for their children, all of the parents also believe that benefits of education are to earn more money, helping in promotion, and improving status in society, all of the parents also believe they should invest money for their children’s education. 3. all of the parents want their children to go to school, majority of the parents want their male children to finish courses in the science while they want their female children to finish arts/philosophy courses. 4. a significant relationship between parents’ occupation status and beliefs on the kind of school parents want their children to study in, between parents’ occupation status and monthly income and beliefs on the location school parents want their children to study. Conclusion Based on the findings, the following conclusions and recommendations were made for the parents: 1. it is concluded that majority of the parents think girls are the same as boys. 2. parents want their children to study in public schools they want male children to study courses in the science. 3. it is also concluded that Chinese parents have high educational aspirations for their children. 4. likewise, the parents want their children to finish post college education. Recommendations: 1. parents: Because of the development of Chinese economy, Chinese become more and more richer day by day. At the same time, because of the Chinese One Child Policy, most family got only one child. Just because of these, Chinese parents want them receive high level education and become competitive after their graduation. They think highly of their own child and this kind of expectation is an invisible pressure to the child. Parents should give free space to the child and let them learn from some other more resources besides of learning from books. 2. government: Government should get some reform on educational system, and change the examination based education into student based education, in order to enrich the personality and abilities of students. Government should let every student show their outstanding aspects and become an outstanding student instead of becoming students of low abilities with high grades in studying.