6-Day Beijing & Shanghai School Management Study Programme

Afternoon - Arrival and welcome
You are met at Beijing Capital or Daxing airport (or at the railway station) with a name board by your programme leader and transferred to your hotel. Rooms are pre-registered so the group can settle straight in.

Late afternoon - Orientation briefing: how Chinese schooling is organised
A structured opening session, led by your programme leader and an invited education specialist. It sets the vocabulary the rest of the week depends on:

• Compulsory education. Schooling in China is compulsory for nine years, covering six years of primary and three of junior middle school; senior middle school is then either academic or vocational.
• Curriculum standards. Subject standards are set nationally, and textbooks are produced against them by approved publishers; schools and local authorities then adapt delivery, timetabling and assessment within that framework. Understanding where national authority ends and school autonomy begins is the single most useful thing to grasp before the school visits.
• Who runs a school. The principal holds the leadership responsibility for the school, supported by deputy principals, grade-level leaders and subject teaching-research groups. That middle layer is where most day-to-day management actually happens.

The school canteen rule - a worked example of regulation into practice
China's Regulation on Food Safety and Nutritional Health in Schools, issued jointly by the Ministry of Education, the State Administration for Market Regulation and the National Health Commission as Order No. 45 (published 20 February 2019, effective 1 April 2019), is a useful case study in how a single document reshapes daily school management:

• Article 12 places the principal formally in charge of food safety in the school - a named, personal responsibility rather than a committee's.
• Article 13 requires a dining-with-students system: at every meal a member of the school's leadership team eats with the students, and keeps a written record of it. Where conditions allow, schools are encouraged to invite parents to join.
• Each meal's dishes must be sampled and retained - at least 125 grams, refrigerated in a dedicated cabinet for a minimum of 48 hours - so that any problem can be traced back.
• Schools able to do so are encouraged to open their kitchens to view, in the policy phrase mingchu liangzao, "bright kitchen, transparent stove".

You will see all four of these at work when you eat in a school canteen on Day 2. They are worth reading carefully in advance, because they are the clearest example in Chinese school management of a national rule expressed as a daily routine.

Evening - Welcome dinner
Dinner at a family-run restaurant in a restored hutong courtyard house, with the programme explained day by day and time for the group to set its own questions for the schools. Before dinner, a short walk through the old lanes and along the edge of Tiananmen Square gives a first sense of the city's scale.

Meals
Dinner

Accommodation
4-star hotel in central Beijing, twin share, breakfast included.

Morning - The operating rhythm of a Beijing school
You arrive before the first bell. Your hosts walk the delegation through what it actually takes to run the day: how the master timetable is built and re-built each term within national guidance on periods per subject; how class sizes are set and how pupils are grouped; how duty rosters cover corridors, gates, the canteen and the playground; and who signs what, at what hour, on an ordinary school day. The campus walk is organised around those responsibilities rather than the other way round - teaching building, subject laboratories, library and reading rooms, the psychology and counselling room, arts and music rooms, sports hall and outdoor facilities, each with the staff member who owns it.

Late morning - Two lessons, seen as timetabled practice
We arrange two lessons in subjects of your choice, almost always one mathematics and one Chinese language lesson, with the class teacher's consent and no disruption to the lesson. The purpose is operational as much as pedagogical: how a period is actually used, what the teacher is required to record, how the lesson closes so that the next one can start on time. Look in particular at:

• Class size and seating, and whether pupils are grouped by attainment within the room.
• How the teacher questions the class, and how long pupils are given to answer.
• Board work and the use of the digital whiteboard; how much of the lesson is whole-class, group or individual work.
• How the lesson closes - what the pupils are asked to do next, and how the teacher checks that they have understood.

A short debrief with the teacher immediately afterwards is usually the most valuable part of the morning.

Lunch - In the school canteen
You eat with the students, and you can see the dining-with-students system working: a member of the school's leadership team eats in the hall and signs the daily record. Your hosts can show you the retained sample cabinet, the delivery inspection records and the kitchen viewing arrangements introduced under the 2019 regulation. This is a good place to ask operational questions - contract catering versus in-house provision, portion control, and how the school handles allergies and religious or cultural dietary requirements.

Afternoon - The subject teaching-research group
The jiaoyanzu, or teaching-research group, is the structure that carries professional practice inside a Chinese school, and it has no exact equivalent in most Western systems. Teachers of the same subject meet on a fixed weekly cycle to plan lessons together, observe one another, moderate marking and examinations against a common standard, and bring on newly qualified colleagues. In this session you sit with a working group, look at a real lesson plan and assessment paper, and discuss how the group's decisions bind (or do not bind) the individual teacher. It is the mechanism most often recommended for visitors to study closely.

Late afternoon - The Guozijian quarter
On the way back, a walk through the Confucius Temple and the Imperial College, or Guozijian, the state academy that trained officials for the imperial examinations for some six centuries. It is a fitting end to the first school day: the oldest institution of higher learning in the city, the newest classroom you have just observed, and the same argument about standards and assessment in between.

Evening - Dinner and debrief
Dinner with your programme leader, comparing notes from the day. Each delegate is encouraged to keep two running lists for the week: what transfers to our own school, and what does not.

Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Accommodation
4-star hotel in central Beijing, twin share, breakfast included.

Morning - High-speed rail, Beijing to Shanghai
Transfer to the railway station for a G-series high-speed train to Shanghai Hongqiao. The line runs about 1,318 kilometres and takes roughly four and a half to six hours depending on the service, so the journey is itself worth watching: stations the size of airports, boarding completed in a few minutes, and punctuality measured in minutes rather than hours. Complimentary water and a snack box are provided on board; your programme leader will confirm your seats and second-class or first-class allocation in advance. Delegates who prefer to fly can be rebooked, but the rail journey is the better introduction to how the two cities relate.

Early afternoon - Arrival and the Shanghai partner school
You are met at Shanghai Hongqiao and driven to the partner school for an introductory session with its leadership team. The shape of the visit differs deliberately from Beijing: Chinese schooling is set nationally but delivered locally, and Beijing and Shanghai have noticeably different traditions of school autonomy, principal appointment and teacher development. This first afternoon sets the contrast up so that you can test it over the following two days.

Afternoon - Boarding life and pastoral care
If the partner school takes boarding students, this is the day to see that side of the operation. Boarding management in Chinese schools is a distinct discipline and an area many visiting school leaders find genuinely instructive:

• The house structure - who is on duty, including at night, and how the boarding team relates to the teaching staff.
• Dormitory rules, room allocation by year group, and how the school handles homesickness, illness and disputes.
• Pastoral provision: the counselling room, the class teacher's role as first point of contact for a family, and how concerns are escalated.
• Mealtimes, curfews and screen and mobile-phone policy.

We confirm in writing whether the partner school for your dates is day-only, boarding, or both, before your delegation commits to travel.

Evening - The evening study period, and a walk on the Bund
Where the school's schedule allows, you are invited to look in briefly on the supervised evening study period, which many Chinese secondary schools run for boarders. It is a quiet, highly structured hour or so, and the questions it raises about homework, independent study and staff rostering are usually lively.

Afterwards, dinner, then a walk along the Bund for your first sight of the Pudong skyline from the west bank. The contrast between the 1920s banking facades on one side of the Huangpu and the towers on the other is Shanghai in one view.

Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Accommodation
4-star hotel in central Shanghai, twin share, breakfast included.

Morning - What a principal actually controls
A day built around the principal's real decision space rather than the organogram. Shanghai schools sit at one end of the Chinese spectrum for school-level autonomy, and the difference from Beijing is worth testing directly. The session works through where authority genuinely lies:

• Staffing. What the principal decides locally and what is set by the district: recruitment, teaching allocation, promotion recommendations, and how a weak performer is handled.
• Money. The school budget, which lines are ring-fenced, how discretionary spending is approved, and how a head teacher builds a case for investment in a building, a laboratory or a programme.
• Curriculum and the school day. Where national and municipal requirements stop and local design begins - elective provision, after-school programmes under the 2021 "double reduction" policy, and how a school differentiates itself.
• Parents and accountability. How parents raise concerns, how the school handles a serious complaint, what a district inspection examines, and which results the principal is genuinely judged on.

Classroom time is built into the morning so that these questions can be tested against real lessons rather than discussed in the abstract.

Lunch - In the school canteen
Again with the students, and again with the dining-with-students record on view. By now the delegation usually has specific questions about how a national food-safety regulation is audited in practice, and the school's staff can answer them directly.

Afternoon - Working roundtable
The centrepiece of the programme. The agenda is set by your delegation and sent to the school two to three weeks in advance, so that the Chinese leadership team arrives prepared. Topics that work well include teacher workload and non-teaching duties, class size and grouping, homework policy and the effect of the 2021 "double reduction" policy on after-school provision, assessment and examination pressure, parent expectations and communication, staff recruitment and retention, and how a school manages change when national policy shifts. Interpretation is provided by your programme leader, and each session is chaired so that both sides get equal time on each item.

Late afternoon - The former French Concession on foot
A walk in the plane-tree streets of the former French Concession, through Fuxing Park, where retired residents dance, play cards and practise calligraphy in the late afternoon, and on into the lanes around Tianzifang. It is a useful counterweight to the morning's systems talk: the school you visited sits inside a neighbourhood with its own social rhythms, and school leaders here work with those rhythms rather than apart from them.

Evening - Dinner and reflective session
Dinner, followed by a chaired reflective session: what each delegate would take back, and what they would leave. Notes from this session form the basis of the closing report on Day 6.

Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Accommodation
4-star hotel in central Shanghai, twin share, breakfast included.

Morning - Building and keeping a teaching team
A working session with the school's academic leadership on the teacher workforce, the part of Chinese school management most often cited by visiting heads as worth studying closely:

• Recruitment. Where teachers come from, the qualifications and teaching certificates required, and how a school recruits against a public examination and assignment system.
• Induction and mentoring. The first-year arrangements, the mentor or master-teacher relationship, and how a newly qualified teacher's load is protected while they learn.
• Continuing development. The hours of required in-service training, the teaching-research group as the everyday vehicle for development, open lessons and demonstration lessons, and the role of visiting external experts.
• Evaluation and promotion. How teacher performance is assessed, who does the assessing, what evidence is used, and how the career and title ladder from probationary teacher through to senior and specialist grades works. Ask, in particular, how much weight rests on pupil examination results and how much on observation and peer review - the honest answer varies considerably between schools.

Lunch - In the school canteen
A last lunch with the students, and a chance to thank the canteen and catering staff.

Afternoon - The National Smart Education Platform
China's National Smart Education Platform for Primary and Secondary Schools was launched for trial operation on 1 March 2022, with the wider National Smart Education Platform going live on 28 March 2022. It is a national, centrally curated digital library: recorded lessons by recognised teachers, structured teaching materials, homework and assessment resources, and teacher-training content, free at the point of use. Its stated purposes are to support the reduction of homework and out-of-school tutoring burdens, and to keep teaching running during school closures.

In this session you see how a school actually uses it rather than how it is presented publicly: which year groups and subjects draw on it most, how teachers are expected to blend it with their own lessons, what it is deliberately not used for, and how a school head judges whether the time spent on it is worth the return. Ask also about the limits - content that does not fit a particular school's intake, and the problem every system of this kind faces, which is that a national library cannot know your school's pupils. Your hosts will be direct about this.

Late afternoon - Lujiazui and the Yu Garden bazaar
Cross to Pudong for the skyline and the Jin Mao Tower, then back to the old city for the Yu Garden bazaar - the most commercial corner of Shanghai and, after a week of policy and practice, a reminder that the schools you have been studying serve a city of twenty-five million people with very different lives in it.

Evening - Dinner and preparation of the closing report
Dinner, then a short working session in which each delegate finalises their comparison notes for Day 6.

Meals
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Accommodation
4-star hotel in central Shanghai, twin share, breakfast included.

Morning - Closing session
Each delegate presents a short set of comparison notes: what they saw, what they judged transferable to their own school, and what they judged not to be. The chair keeps the discussion honest - the useful output is a clear-eyed list, not a second week of reassurance. Where the group agrees on a finding, it is recorded; where the delegation disagrees, both positions are recorded, which is usually more informative.

If two or three common priorities emerge, this session is also when the group identifies them formally, so that they can be followed up as a delegation rather than as individuals.

Late morning - Certificates and farewells
A certificate of attendance is presented to each delegate, and the programme leader collects your written evaluation of the two partner schools, which we pass back to them. This is the part of the week that keeps the door open for the next delegation.

Optional - Shanghai Urban Planning Exhibition Centre
For delegates with an afternoon or evening departure, the Shanghai Urban Planning Exhibition Centre in People's Square is a compact and unexpectedly useful final stop. Its models of the city's growth show how housing, transport and school provision have been planned together across decades - which is the same question the schools you visited are answering on a much smaller scale.

Afternoon - Departure
Transfer to Pudong International or Hongqiao airport, or to Hongqiao railway station, according to your onward arrangements. If your flight departs from Pudong, we can run the transfer via the maglev from Longyang Road on request - a nine-minute connection to the airport and an oddly fitting end to a week spent looking at how systems are built. Please confirm your flight times at least 72 hours in advance so that the pick-up is scheduled correctly.

Meals
Breakfast, Lunch

Accommodation
No hotel night. The programme ends with your departure transfer. Late departures can be accommodated with day rooms at a supplement.