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.
Migrant education
The primary form of migration within China isn't that of rural-rural farming migration, but that of rural-urban migration. Through the hukou system, a form of citizenship registration, the Chinese government divides citizens into one of two categories of: urban or rural. Historically, this has created a hierarchy between urban and rural citizens because strict regulations give urbanites more access to healthcare, education, food, etc. Migration has led to a changing demographic of cities. According to the 2010 Census, 210 million urban-to-rural migrants are living in cities, without official hukou registration. Of these migrants, about 20 million are children between the ages of 6 and 14 years struggling to receive quality education because they are not registered within the school district. Many local governments require that everyone complete at least 9 years of education; however, migrant children weren't allowed to enroll in urban schools until 1996. The Ministry of Education issued "Provisional Measures for the Education of Migrant Children" in 1998, but because this was not actually legally binding, many factors continue to prohibit migrants from receiving education:For rural migrant children who do succeed in enrolling in state schools, discrimination is prevalent: in most schools, migrant children do not receive official grades and can not receive academic honors. Because of this, many parents choose to send their children to unlicensed, privately run migrant-specific ("black") schools. The quality of education in these schools is poor because they lack the same resources as state schools—specifically qualified teachers. Depending on the region, these "black" schools are also under threat of closure. In 2007 in Shanghai, every unlicensed migrant school in the center of the city was closed. However, schools on the outskirts of the city and in the majority migrant Xiamen Special Economic Zone, 34 unlicensed schools were allowed.