What is the initiative and where is it implemented (city or country, for example)?
Shanghai was the first Chinese city to adopt the learning city concept: in 1999, it began to promote the lifelong development of all its citizens. At the level of policy and administration, this involved devising leadership mechanisms, reforming the city’s legal system and publishing guidance documents. On the ground, Shanghai began to offer a greater variety of learning opportunities to its citizens, including different methods of classroom teaching, digital learning, learning groups and study tours; all were designed to encourage participation in lifelong learning.
How was the initiative established? How was it implemented?
More recently, the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission oversaw a pilot project to establish learning villages in districts within the municipality. Primarily, the project sought to promote lifelong learning and sustainable development in rural areas surrounding the city of Shanghai. A series of steps were followed from the point of the pilot project’s conception to its realization.
- A project team for overall planning
The first step was to set up a team to plan the project. The Service and Guidance Centre for Building a Learning Society created a team of representatives of the Lifelong Education Division of the Municipal Education Commission, the Municipal Agricultural Commission, Shanghai Open University, the education bureaus of the pilot zones and community colleges. Once formed, the team met regularly at Shanghai Open University to formulate concrete goals and methods of implementation for the project.
- A project research team for theoretical guidance
To ensure that the project to create learning villages was theoretically grounded and well researched, a project research team was assembled by extending invitations to researchers working in community colleges. This team proceeded to conduct research into six main subject areas:
- rural development in Shanghai and other cities and provinces;
- theoretical foundations of learning villages;
- the organization of learning points within rural communities;
- means of promoting villagers’ holistic development;
- opportunities for innovation with regard to the key dimensions of learning villages;
- opportunities for innovation in the provision of learning in rural contexts.
This team met regularly and produced six pieces of research, which provided the overall project with theoretical guidance.
- Identifying specific projects to promote the development of learning villages
For the implementation of the project, pilot sites were invited to submit proposals for projects that could support transformation into a learning village. Ten projects were selected and later implemented at the pilot sites. Most of the sites were whole villages, though there were also individual institutions, including a community college, an adult school and an education commission. The projects themselves varied in their foci, with some orientated more towards economic development – such as a project to create a brand of tea – while others had more overtly sociocultural objectives, like a project on rural poetry.
- Producing guidelines for the project
The project team created and issued ‘Guidelines on Carrying out the Pilot Project of Learning Villages’, which contained eight main activities that should be carried out in the pilot zones of the project:
- the promotion of rural learning;
- the formation of a high-level team of teachers;
- the provision of adequate resources;
- a focus on high-quality content;
- the use of innovative teaching methods;
- the creation of distinct brands;
- the implementation of functional improvements in the area;
- a push towards meaningful benefits for local villagers.
- Evaluating the project
At the conclusion of the project, a number of achievements were noted in relation to the following themes:
- safeguarding the rights of farmers to develop and improve their quality of life;
- protecting rural culture and promoting cultural literacy;
- providing impetus for economic and industrial development;
- establishing innovative methods to improve rural governance at the grassroots level;
- promoting a green lifestyle to support a green environment.
Which stakeholders are involved in the design and/or implementation of the initiative? Which sectors do they represent?
To ensure the progress of the project, the Shanghai Learning Village Construction Alliance was set up, involving multi-level stakeholders in its implementation. Led by municipal governments, organized by districts, supported at the level of towns and streets, a cross-level learning village construction system has been created through a top-down approach. Specifically, the Lifelong Education Division of the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission is responsible for the top-level design and overall planning of the project. Shanghai Open University and Shanghai Service and Supervision Centre for Learning Society Construction are responsible for organization and coordination, project formulation, supervision, and dynamic monitoring. Relevant district-level education bureaus and community schools provide service guidance, policy support and fund guarantees. Township community schools provide supporting measures and resources for teachers, courses, teaching materials, extracurricular activities, teaching equipment and resources for constructing learning villages. In this way, the chosen pilot villages localize the construction plan by utilizing support from multi-level stakeholders. To facilitate the process, the Shanghai Learning Village Construction Alliance holds occasional meetings to exchange ideas and discuss the project’s goals and key tasks, review progress and phased effect, and make suggestions for enhancement.
What are the impacts of the initiative in terms of facilitating lifelong learning? Whom does it benefit and how?
The Shanghai Learning Village Construction Project adheres to the principles of treating villagers as the drivers, being demand-oriented and adopting localization with a classified policy. It focuses on the villagers’ training requirements of ‘open mindset, diverse carriers, flexible methods, practical content, high-quality resources, brand effect, and universal coverage’. An endogenous developing training model has been formulated for villagers.
First of all, villagers have benefitted from targeted education which has enhanced their ability to improve their living standards. For instance, the project has set up political theory training for village cadres, employment and entrepreneurship training for villagers outside, new vocational farmer training for rural residents, vocational skills training for migrant workers and leisure and entertainment activities for elderly villagers. Thanks to the targeted education method, villagers have formed habits of lifelong learning. As a result, more than 200,000 of them participate in learning activities every year. Through this project, a considerable number of villagers have become learning pioneers and industry professionals. In return, they offer support and assistance to the development of a wide variety of rural talents, thus contributing to rural revitalization.
Secondly, emphasizing the role of cultural empowerment has boosted rural revitalization. Through the development of cultural learning projects with rural characteristics, the local culture of the village has prospered, traditional intangible cultural heritage has been protected, and a cultural atmosphere of lifelong learning has been created. The project attaches importance to setting up role models, using typical learning villagers to guide others, and to establish a new style of civilization. Neighbourhood role models disseminate their learning behaviours, which activates a sense of belonging among villagers, stimulates the endogenous power of rural revitalization and helps rural existence to reform radically from inside to outside. Therefore, the risks of social phenomena such as ‘physically rich but spiritually poor’ or ‘beautiful landscape with little popularity’ can largely be avoided.
Last but not least, promoting this successful experience is playing an important role in developing rural education in other provinces and cities. The Shanghai Learning Village Construction Project was brought into the Three-year Action Plan for the Coordinated Development of Community Education and Elderly Education in the Yangtze River Delta (2019-2021). In December 2019, the first Yangtze River Delta Learning Village Construction Seminar was held in Shanghai, and the Yangtze River Delta Learning Village Construction Alliance was launched at the meeting. This project has become a highlight project to promote the integrated development of lifelong education in the Yangtze River Delta. In addition, the high-quality learning resources developed during the implementation of the project are being shared with other provinces and cities such as Xinjiang, Qinghai, Yunnan, Sichuan and Hainan through counterpart assistance to support local rural education and villager training.
References
Unpublished manuscript. Information is provided by Shanghai Open University and Shanghai Service and Supervision Centre for Learning Society Construction