Education in China
Education in China is a state-run system of public education run by the Ministry of Education. All citizens must attend school for at least nine years, known as the nine-year compulsory education, which is funded by the government. Compulsory education includes six years of primary education, starting at age six or seven, and three years of junior secondary education (junior middle school) for ages 12 to 15. Some provinces may have five years of primary school but four years for junior middle school. After junior middle school, there are three years of senior middle school, which then completes the secondary education.
Prison education
Changes were made to prison system in China in the 1920s, following the establishment of the Republic of China. Resulting from criticism of the lack of education for inmates at the time, there was a shift in the prison system away from religious and moral teaching, to intellectual education and hard labour as the primary means of rehabilitation. Authorities took considerable effort to develop an effective and diverse educational curriculum. As well as teaching literacy and arithmetic, classes also included music and composition, popular ethics, confucianism and patriotic and political doctrine; the teaching of party doctrine increased significantly in the 1930s. In 1981, the People's Republic of China incorporated prison education into its national education program, significantly increasing access for inmates.