A Survey Report on a Political Theory Course based on Ethnic Pre-college Policy Implementation Research

Long Zhangxin　KangxiaoZhuoma

Abstract:The Ethnic pre-college education policy of our country is a product of the combination of China餾 ethnic policy and its education policy. This in turn is a part of China餾 tertiary education system, and has implications for ethnicity. Benefiting from the preferential policies of pre-college ethnic education, the numbers of minority students in colleges and universities in ethnic minority areas is increasing year by year. A large number of minority cadres and applied talents have been cultivated, and they have made an important contribution to the economic development of the ethnic regions. This article, based on data, illustrates that providing ethnic pre-college education can have a real impact on promoting the ideological and political level of ethnic minority pre-college students. It can link their college studies, accumulate their knowledge, and improve their social communication skills, etc. For this group of students, “ethnic pre-college education” is necessary, and to carry out the pre-college education policy is also a necessary way to ensure the practice of our country餾 pre-college education policy.

The research on our country餾 ethnic pre-college education policy involves many aspects. Based on the rules of the political theory course set in China餾 pre-college education, and through an investigation using a questionnaire on the effect of teaching the national theory and national policy course during the course of implementing ethnic pre-college education policy, this article will especially be concerned with its impact on the promotion of ethnic pre-college students political level; and the links between college subjects and the accumulation of knowledge. Moreover, this article will also be concerned with gender differences in these aspects. Because there is diversity among the pre-college students with regard to their learning ability, languages, and subject classification, we cannot consider this investigation from the perspective of generalizations. This discussion will only focus on the situation of pre-college students from Xinjiang; the sample respondents of the questionnaires are Xinjiang students drawn from an ethnic pre-college education base during the academic year of 2013-2014. A total of 45 questionnaires were distributed, and all of them were collected. Twenty informants were males, and 25 were female.

According to the question proposed in this discussion, i.e. the effect of the political theory course set in China餾 ethnic pre-college education, we designed two parts to the questionnaire, including the political theory course from the viewpoint of the ethnic pre-college students and their level of understanding of the course from the perspective of two dimensions, including cognition and school work. The former included an investigation on the experience continuity of similar courses in the stages of ethnic pre-college education and in the education before the stage. We investigated some basic information concerning the current political theory course, such as the students understanding of the course name, the research objectives, and its purpose,etc. as well as the degree of their future willingness to learn the political theory course. The latter mainly focused on asking questions related to the content of the course, such as the basic principles of China餾 ethnic policy, ethnic issues, ethnic education policy, and the policy related to the freedom of religious beliefs.And, we further wanted to see the level of understanding the students had regarding the basic laws of ethnicity and ethnic issues after they took the ethnic theory and policy course.

Ethnic Theory and Ethnic Policy is one of required courses in our country餾 ethnic pre-college education. The setting of this course is a necessary part of the political theory course for the college students, and it is also closely related to the fact that ethnic students are relatively concentrated in China餾 ethnic pre-college education stage. From the result of the questionnaire, we discovered that the experience of taking political theory education before the pre-college education could make a definite impact on the students learning enthusiasm, method and purpose when they take the political theory courses in the pre-college education stage. Due to the pressures resulting from long-term examinations, the negative influence on the students learning enthusiasm is the largest. Compared with the male students, the female students are more easily influenced by their past learning experiences. However, when they do not need to shoulder the burden of the pressure of the college entrance examination, most of the students are aware of the importance of political theory course after receiving a period of pre-college education. Hence, their self-consciousness and enthusiasm with regard to learning has been promoted. In addition, feedback from the questionnaires also reflected that present ethnic theory and ethnic policy course has a positive effect in helping the students acquire more knowledge on ethnicity, ethnic policy, and enabled them to become more concerned about ethnic development. According to the investigation, some of students even reached a level where they applied what they learned into practice.

With regard to the aspect of learning related knowledge positively in order to promote political ideological level, around half of the informants expressed that they were willing to spend some time and energy to learn related knowledgeby themselves.This was due to the influence of the learning experience. Among them,the male students choice of the content for self-learning is relatively singular, but the scope is broader, and the level of learning is lower. The female students choice of the content for self-learning is relatively diversified, however, the actual content or self-learning is relatively narrow, and the level of learning is deep. All this indicates that through the political theory course or the self-learning of related knowledge in pre-college education, most of students already have their own cognition and ways for promoting their political and ideological level, and they do not take the examinations as their sole purpose for study anymore. This breakthrough is good for their self-adjustment to learning methods, learning contents, and learning purposes after they come to their senior study.

With regard to knowledge accumulation, we can notice from the feedback of the questionnaires that the students were able to correctly use the Marxist concept on nationality and religion to understand ethnic issues, ethnic relations, ethnic equity, ethnic regional autonomy, ethnic education, and the freedom of religious beliefs, etc. The knowledge level of female students is better than that of male students. However, it is obvious thatthe ability of both male students and female students to grasp basic knowledge is not comprehensive, systematic and deep enough. This is due to the reason that the pre-college students from Xinjiang have their own particularity with learning language, learning content and learning foundation. There are various degrees of difficulties during the process of learning and expressing. Hence, we should not take the results of the test-style investigation result as a unique criterion for evaluating the status of their knowledge accumulation.

In conclusion, the result of this investigation among the pre-college Xinjiang students confirms the necessity and inevitability of settinga political theory course according to our country餾 pre-college education policy. It is not only an efficient approach for promoting the students ideological and political level, but also an important step for improving the students school work.Meanwhile, it could broaden the students scope of knowledge, and enhance the students capacity to adapt in their future study and social life.

Key Words: policy implementation effect; ethnic pre-college education; political theory course

Reference:

Bao Leri. 玧ianguo yilai minzu yuke jiaoyu zhengce de huigu yu sikao (A Review on the Ethnic Pre-college Policy since the Founding of New China). In 獷thnic Research Studies, 2013(2): 32-35.