China’s middle class families fret as President Xi Jinping ‘tightens grip’ on international schools

Under the Regulations for the Implementation of the Private Education Promotion Law, no new licenses will be granted to international schools offering compulsory education - six years of primary education followed by three years of junior high school education. Chinese-run private schools teaching compulsory education are also banned from using foreign textbooks, though private schools teaching grades 10-12 can continue offering international curricula. Since the law change, Harrow International School in Hainan is the first private institution to be told by a provincial government to apply for a general high school license to continue international programmes for senior students. "We originally planned to send our 10-year-old daughter to an international school for junior school next year We want her to study the Western mindset and develop the skill of critical thinking, and then study at a world-renowned university abroad," she said. More than 900 international schools were registered with China's education authority last year, of which about 110 accepted only foreign students, according to NewSchool Insight Media, a service platform for international schools in China. In early November, Westminster School, one of Britain's most prestigious private schools, said it would abandon its first overseas school in Chengdu, Sichuan province, four years after it started the project. In a letter to past and current staff and students, Mark Batten, chair of the school's governing body, said the Covid-19 pandemic and "Recent changes in Chinese education policy" had forced the school to axe the entire project.