In today's report in our reform and opening up series, we turn to the year of 1986. On December 18th of that year, prime-time media reports gave higher than usual coverage of education. Television journalists travelled from north to south, collecting stories about students' lives and changes in the education system.

Students and teachers in 1986 began to benefit from a whole new approach to education.

This is a primary school in Taiyuan, capital of north China's Shanxi province. During the past few semesters, failure rates in exams were maintained at the unbelievable record of zero. More amazingly, pupils here no longer had piles of homework, nor did they spend much time preparing for examinations. All the work was assigned in the class, and finished in the classroom. The school even cancelled tests at the end of the year, dividing them into regular exams during the semester.

And here in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in south China, thousands of young people joined the country's first batch of students to take part in a new military training program. In the 1950s, military training was highly professional and mainly for recruitment purposes. However, in 1985, the government issued policies to revamp this system, announcing that military training in the schools would be gradually transformed to serve educational purposes. Students were given a basic introduction to military combat, team formation, as well as how to make their dormitories tidier.

In central China's Hunan province, the excitement of going to school was not only about knowledge, but also food. Management reform injected incentives for restaurants on the campus to compete for more money. The restaurants were contracted to people outside of the school. Although the picture here suggests a great deal still could be done to improve hygiene, a menu to choose from five vegetable dishes and five meat dishes was undeniably mouth watering.

Traditionally, education occupies a high position in the Chinese value system. However, during the cultural revolution, intellectuals were purged as counter revolutionaries. Students dropped out of school and were sent to the countryside for hard work.

It was not until 1985 when the government published its first policy, defining the objectives of education to train professionals, and develop science and technology. The government also decided to loosen government control of schools, acknowledging their independence, and allowing education reforms to adapt to social and economic changes.

(CCTV November 27, 2008)