Who Really Runs China’s Schools? The 2,898 People Who Never Taught

Who really runs China’s grassroots schools? The 2,898 people in charge

In 2019, Beijing Normal University surveyed 2,898 education bureau directors across 26 provinces. Cheng Jianping, then a national political advisor and party secretary of the university, found the results alarming. Many grassroots education leaders had been appointed or transferred from outside education. They lacked the professional capacity to guide reform. A book by Cong Chunxia of the National Academy of Education Administration added detail: only 39.3 percent of directors had previously served as principals or deputy bureau directors. 60.7 percent came from township governments, county party committees, or county government offices. Among sitting directors, 43 percent had no education work experience.

In many places, the person in charge of education had never stood in a classroom.

This is not a rare case. It is how the system is built.

The three thirds: where grassroots directors come from

The National Academy of Education Administration trains these officials. A breakdown of one training cohort showed a pattern. About one third of county and district directors came from the education system, including schools and education bureaus. About one third came from other government departments, such as finance and urban management. About one third had worked in townships, local party committees, or government offices.

Only a small group had walked up from the classroom.

Ni Minjing, deputy director of the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission, has been blunt. "The selection mechanism for grassroots education bureau directors mainly follows the Organization Department's cadre selection procedures, and the education system itself has no clear standards or thresholds for the professional qualifications of education bureau directors. As a result, a large number of grassroots directors come from non-educational backgrounds. This is a normal state of affairs." Ni has met directors without education experience. "Although they are very capable," he said, "when they actually take up education work, some still face the problem of not understanding education well enough."

Gao Zheng, an associate researcher at the National Academy of Education Administration, described a structural contradiction. At the prefecture and municipal level, more directors come from inside the education system. Many are transferred from key middle schools or secondary specialized schools. Those principals are division-level cadres. Division-level cadres move between public institutions and government agencies, and the personnel system allows it. County and district education bureaus, however, are section-level units. Civil servants and public institution staff below the section level face barriers to movement. It is hard to select directly from principals.

The result is a paradox. The closer a position is to the classroom, the harder it is to find a director from inside the education system. Behind that paradox is a deeper tension between cadre rotation and the professional nature of education. Ni Minjing once submitted a proposal called "On the need for educational professional quality in the appointment of county and district education bureau directors." He argued that a director needs political and professional qualities, and also a grasp of how education works.

The outsider logic: from GDP to enrollment rates

Zhang Zhiyong, deputy director of the Shandong Provincial Education Department, proposed professional qualification standards for education bureau directors at the National Two Sessions in 2012. He cited data from the National Academy of Education Administration. Among municipal and county directors in China, 60 percent had no teaching experience and entered the job from another industry.

Zhang described how outsider directors govern. Because they lack professional knowledge and practice, they have little motivation to run education by educational laws. "They often manage education and primary and secondary schools using methods borrowed from economic management," he said. "The most prominent sign is the mindset of 'look at GDP to judge the economy, look at enrollment rates to judge education.' They regard the pursuit of enrollment rates as the foundation of education that satisfies the people, leading to educational development that is incomplete, unhealthy, unscientific, and unsustainable."

Management standards drift. Professional administrators focus on classroom quality, student growth, and teacher development. Outsider directors often cannot judge classroom teaching, so they apply generic administrative assessments. They value paperwork, event spectacle, and inspection data. Teachers spend hours organizing materials and coping with inspections. Teaching gets squeezed. Frontline teachers know the pattern: safety platforms, education apps, study tasks, check-ins, screenshots. Many come from outsider directors improvising. Teachers struggle to keep up. Time for lesson preparation and teaching research shrinks.

A commentator in Hunan recorded a scene. At a seminar for graduating-class teachers, a bureau director demanded that school rankings scroll on an electronic screen. He also distributed information about subject teachers. The move ignored the complexity and long-term nature of education. It harmed teachers' reputations and dignity.

Yin Zhihui, a teacher at Renmin Road Primary School in Yiyang, Hunan, said what many teachers feel. "If you are not an insider, when you manage, you have no management methods or innovative awareness of your own; you just convey the spirit of documents from above." Jiang Dongwen, a special-grade teacher at Huanong Vocational Secondary School, pointed to another problem. "For a long time after taking office, it is still hard to truly enter the role of an educator. By the time you have just become familiar with education work, a three-to-five-year term has arrived. During this period, it is easy to produce blind and short-sighted educational decisions."

The missing credential: teachers have licenses, principals have certificates, directors have nothing

The deepest institutional gap is simple. Teachers need teaching licenses. Principals need principal qualification certificates. Education bureau directors, who manage teachers and principals, need no qualification at all.

Cheng Jianping found three missing pieces. There is no professional access system for education administrative leaders. There is no professional ability standard. There is no graded, categorized, or post-specific training. Performance reviews for these leaders often look like reviews for other administrative departments. Administration outweighs education.

Cheng proposed an access system and a pilot qualification certificate system. The goal is to guard the entrance and stop outsiders from leading insiders. Zhang Zhiyong proposed that when the Organization Department nominates a director, it should seek opinions from education sector representatives and the party group of the higher-level education department.

Why does the background of directors matter so much? Chang Siliang, a professor at Hunan Normal University's School of Educational Science, offered context. "At present, China has about 530,000 schools of all levels and types, with 291 million students, of whom 158 million are in compulsory education, and more than 10 million teachers. The scale is enormous, and the situation is complex." If a director does not understand education, "an education bureau director is very likely to handle educational problems arbitrarily."

Institutional attempts exist. But unclear theory, vague selection standards, and weak professional governance capacity have blocked professionalization. None of it has become a national system.

Reform is already underway: from Weifang to Hunan

Pioneers exist.

Weifang, Shandong, an education highland, created a qualification system for county-level directors in 2012. It required the main leader to "love education, be a graduate of a normal college or normal program, or have experience in education work." It also required that at least two thirds of the leadership team have education work experience, including someone who had served as a principal. Weifang built a system for public selection, reserve talent, rank assessment, term rotation, delayed retirement for outstanding principals, and director qualifications. The 178 principals selected all came from the frontline and understood education. Weifang also broke administrative rank barriers. Thirteen county and district education bureau deputy directors gave up director roles to become principals. They entered a principal reserve pool through exams. Five became school principals. A total of 469 principals rotated from cities to rural areas and from strong schools to weak ones.

In January 2023, the Hunan Provincial Party Committee and Provincial Government issued the Opinions on Further Improving the Quality of Compulsory Education. The document said education department leaders should be selected and strengthened. In principle, county-level directors should have an education background or education work experience. This was the first provincial requirement of its kind. Hunan Education News explained that an education background means theory, while education work experience means teaching practice.

Wu Dinghui, a national advanced worker in education and a ten-year leader of the Pingjiang Education Bureau, commented. "This document once again shows that county-level education bureau directors should be cadres who are insiders or who understand the field. At a critical period when the provincial party committee and provincial government are determined to further improve compulsory education, it is particularly important and urgent to select outstanding cadres with education backgrounds or education work experience for county-level director positions."

Xingyang City in Henan proposed a detailed plan in 2025. Candidates for education bureau director should be no older than 48. They should hold a professional technical title of at least first-level primary or secondary school teacher. They should currently serve as a vice principal or above.

In recent years, the Central Organization Department and the Ministry of Education have required attention to selecting education administrative leaders from outstanding primary and secondary school leaders. Many places now require new directors to have education teaching experience. Hainan set a hard rule in 2015: at least three years of teaching and two years of education management. Guizhou followed in 2021.

Since 2025, some places have started regular cadre sinking and classroom observation. Xinxiang City requires county, district, and municipal education bureau leaders to observe at least one class per month. It promotes a "three entries" teaching research system: entering schools, lesson preparation groups, and classrooms, with weekly lectures and weekly research. Hailing District included a "bureau director linked to schools" system in its annual work points. It uses "director unannounced classroom visits" to shift administration and research downward. These systems use behavioral access to make up for missing qualification access. Directors walk into classrooms to gain professional experience.

International benchmarks: professionalization is common

Other countries set professional requirements for education administrators.

In France, regional education directors are usually selected from university staff with a national doctorate. The cabinet nominates them. The president appoints them by decree. By 1983, the French Ministry of National Education had 27 academies. Academy directors had to hold a national doctorate. Provincial education inspectors also needed a doctorate and had to be among the most senior secondary school teachers.

U.S. states vary, but most set professional thresholds for state education superintendents. Maryland requires candidates to be "experienced and competent educators," including seven years of teaching and administrative experience. Tennessee law says the commissioner of education should have "literary and scientific attainments" and "skill and experience in school management," plus qualifications to teach in the highest-level schools. A review of state requirements shows 16 states require education or administrative experience. Twelve require a certain level of education, from a bachelor's to a master's degree.

Japan's law is clearer. The superintendent of education must be appointed from those who are "of noble character and have insight into educational administration." The assembly must approve. After a 2014 revision, the law requires "professional knowledge and experience in education and a high level of insight."

Education is a professional field, not a generic administrative post. When many of nearly 3,000 directors lack education system experience, it is hard to expect education management to follow educational laws.

Outsiders are not useless

Reform is not simply about prioritizing insiders. The issue is more complex than insiders versus outsiders.

Li Qian, an associate researcher at the National Academy of Education Administration, has led training classes for grassroots directors. She offers balance. "We should also see the advantages of education bureau directors from outside the system. For example, if the director of the Human Resources and Social Security Bureau becomes the education bureau director, he can quickly straighten out staffing issues." After discussions with many directors, Li concluded that developed regions demand higher professional quality. Only professional talent can handle complex reform. In less developed regions, outsider directors have unique advantages. "In these places, the director needs extremely high coordination and activity abilities to coordinate human, financial, and material resources for education."

Lu Jianguo, director of the Education Bureau of Ganyu District in Lianyungang, Jiangsu, transferred from a township party committee secretary. In Ganyu, Lu promoted reforms recognized by the profession and the public. His experience: "As an outsider director, what I rely on is learning, going deep into the frontline to investigate, and at the same time combining my administrative experience to carry out the work."

Fang Hua, deputy director of the 21st Century Education Research Institute, put it directly. "The education bureau director is a position that combines administrative management and professional management. Whether people come from inside or outside the system, each has strengths and weaknesses. Education should not be exclusionary; it should welcome directors from outside the system to activate a pool of spring water."

The job has two dimensions. One is administrative management: resource coordination, decision-making, management, and promotion. The other is educational professionalism: value pursuit, judgment, problem-solving, and practical promotion. An ideal director has both. Reality rarely provides both. The key is not background. The key is institutional design that lets the two abilities complement each other.

Education bureau staff often argue that the bureau is a whole. It gathers specialized staff with teaching experience. Deputy directors usually have relevant backgrounds. If the director delegates fully, an outsider can maintain good operation. But this ideal state needs three conditions. The deputy directors must have real professional ability. The director must delegate to professional deputies. The assessment system must not force the director to prove himself with administrative indicators. These conditions rarely hold at once.

There is a harder question. When directors come from the education frontline, is education no longer involuted? Will they be good family members for teachers? Will they dare to refuse the flood of non-teaching tasks? Can they resist enrollment rates? As long as the exam environment and employment pressure remain, little changes. Sometimes, directors from the education frontline understand the system's rules too well. They have been immersed too long. They find it harder to escape path dependence.

Conclusion: professional governance without nativism

Zhang Zhiyong proposed in 2012 to reform the selection of educational talent and establish a qualification system for local education bureau directors. He proposed four standards. The first is deep insight. "Education is for cultivating people ten or twenty years later." The judgment still holds. Educational investment is long-term, hidden, and lagging. Its results are hard to quantify. Professional judgment matters.

Regulating appointments at the source matters. Establish professional qualification standards. Pilot a certificate system. Improve legal procedures for seeking education sector opinions. These steps can return grassroots education to teaching and educating people. But professional standards must not become another administrative barrier. An ideal design has three layers. First, basic professional access at the entry point. It need not require an education background, but it should require education work experience or systematic education management training. Second, team composition that balances administrative and educational ability. Third, continuous training, teaching research support, and professional accountability to cover individual gaps.

Professionals should manage professional matters. That is not exclusion. It is responsibility to students and teachers. But professional should not mean background. It should mean continuous growth. Directors become educational governance workers with professional literacy through practice, exploration, and theoretical learning. Institutions should create that possibility. They should not draw simple lines based on labels.