1900: A physics genius wandering around Europe

Chapter 192 Six-year compulsory education, girls' school regulations, self-financing
April 1905, 4, Guangdong Education Commissioner.

As the new education envoy, Li Qiwei needs to sort out and solve the various problems left by his predecessor.

Fortunately, Yu Shimei was an old acquaintance and would not hide anything from him or set a trap for him, otherwise, if something unexpected happened right after he took office, it would be a huge blow to his authority.

The biggest problem facing the Ministry of Education at present is insufficient local funding.

Although the New Deal of the Qing Dynasty was carried out with great fanfare and drastic measures, including the establishment of the Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Education, the establishment of enterprises, and the construction of schools, it was in full swing.

It seems as if we will become a world power next year.

But these are just vanity projects.

Anyway, it doesn’t cost any money to set up a new department, just throw a few people in there and it’s done.

As for building schools, I'm sorry, please ask each province to find independent solutions based on your own situation.

The Minister of Revenue has already said that the country is in a state of disrepair and cannot afford to build so many schools.

Even the Imperial University of Peking, which is directly under the central government, is like this.

In real history, after the founding of Imperial University of Peking, in addition to the funding from the Ministry of Revenue, the Qing government also required financial support from various provinces.

From 1902 to 1906, the funding provided by various provinces to the Imperial University was as follows:

Zhili, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Henan, Shandong, Shaanxi, Sichuan, and Guangdong: 1 taels per year.

Zhejiang, Anhui, Fujian, Yunnan, and Shanxi: 5 taels per year.

Guizhou: 2 taels per year.

The provinces are suffering terribly.

Take Guangdong as an example. The province had to support the Imperial University of Peking while building Guangdong University, so the education funds were really stretched.

Simply building a school doesn't cost much, and hard labor in this era is cheap, so it can even be free.

But trying to keep schools, especially universities, running properly is a bottomless pit.

From the beginning of its construction to now, Li Qiwei's Huangpu Polytechnic University has cost 5 pounds, or about 33 taels of silver.

Although this is related to Li Qiwei's high standards, various teaching buildings and laboratory buildings are built with the best materials and craftsmanship.

We have also purchased a lot of teaching equipment.

But personnel expenses are the biggest expense, and we cannot save any money on them.

No matter how beautifully a university is built, it will be useless if the teachers' salaries are low. No one will apply for the jobs and the school will become an empty shell.

To maintain the normal functions of a university, security, accommodation, maintenance, administration, etc. all cost huge amounts of money.

As Guangdong University is one of the only two universities directly under the central government in the Qing Dynasty, it is the face of the Qing Dynasty and naturally its status cannot be too low.

Therefore, most of Guangdong’s educational funds were invested in the construction of Guangdong University.

Even though Guangdong Province is a wealthy province, there are many places to spend money.

After calculating all the expenses, the funds that can be allocated to the Education Department are only 1100 taels, and the rest needs to be figured out by ourselves.

Yu Shimei once went to the Governor-General's Office in person to ask for an audience with Cen Chunxuan, the current Governor-General of Guangdong and Guangxi and Governor of Guangdong.

As a result, the high-ranking official could only say: I have no money.

The key is that Yu Shimei cannot complain, because the same is true for other government offices at all levels. Everyone is short of money, not just you.

Logically speaking, Yu Shimei should have gone to the Guangdong Provincial Governor, because the Provincial Governor was responsible for the finance and administration of a province, and of course also managed education funding.

But the current Governor of Guangdong is Hu Xianglin, a native of Fujian.

For some unknown reason, he had a personal conflict with Yu Shimei, so the latter naturally did not want to lose face and ask for help.

But since ancient times, those who are in charge of money are the bosses. If you don’t ask the governor, you won’t get any money.

After Li Qiwei figured out the whole story, he couldn't help but smile.

Fortunately, I had money and was able to set up Huangpu University of Technology without asking anyone for help.

Otherwise, there probably wouldn’t even be any students here now.

At present, Guangdong University is able to carry out its teaching work normally, partly because there are still relatively few students, all of whom are graduates of various higher education institutions.

On the other hand, teachers’ salaries are currently in arrears.

This is an old tradition. Until the Republic of China period, it was normal for teachers to be owed salaries.

After all, soldiers hold guns and will mutiny if they are not paid.

As a teacher, if you take the books but don’t pay for them, then I will just wait a little longer.

Li Qiwei has vigorously promoted educational reform and certainly does not want to see only a superficial appearance.

His cause could not be satisfied by Whampoa Polytechnic University alone and required the strength of the entire country.

He also wanted to promote six years of compulsory primary education and girls' education, which required even more huge funds.

It won't work just relying on funding from the provincial government.

The solution Li Qiwei thought of temporarily was to raise funds, calling on celebrities from all walks of life in Guangdong and overseas Chinese to donate money to run schools.

In this era, thanks to the invention of the telegraph, overseas Chinese have basically been able to keep in touch with the mainland.

Especially in the coastal provinces, those who go out to explore the world are all brave and hardworking people.

With the Chinese people's hard-working and tenacious spirit, they can build a family business even if they face discrimination overseas.

Many people have also gained huge wealth.

As early as more than a decade ago, overseas Chinese in Guangdong had already begun to help the country and promote the development of Western learning in their hometowns.

This also indirectly promoted the modernization of Guangdong's education, making Guangdong one of the most developed regions in modern Chinese education.

However, the donations Li Qiwei needs are not small.

He wants to create an atmosphere where education is paramount, so that every year there will be people willing to donate and rush to donate.

He has already thought of a solution for this.

On April 1905, 4, the Guangdong Education Commissioner conferred the title of Right Vice Minister of the Ministry of Education on Li Qiwei and submitted a memorial to the court.

Request to pilot six-year compulsory primary education and open girls' schools in Guangdong Province.

When the news came out, it immediately caused a huge sensation across the country.

From the elite to the common people, everyone talks about this policy with great interest.

The newspapers of the revolutionaries even published open articles praising Li Qiwei as the first person in the Qing Dynasty with a long-term educational vision.

The reason why Germany is so strong is all because of education, and they even have nine years of free compulsory education.

Although the current financial situation of the Qing Dynasty made it impossible to implement nine years of compulsory education.

However, if six-year compulsory education is piloted only in Guangdong Province, it is completely feasible and can accumulate experience, laying a solid foundation for more provinces to follow suit.

Moreover, this move will certainly stimulate poor families to send their children to school and increase the base of the people receiving education.

Now that the imperial examination system has been abolished, there are more and more new enterprises, which require new talents.

Therefore, this gave ordinary people the motivation to go to school. Li Qiwei also suggested in his memorial that for primary schools, compulsory education should be implemented like Germany.

In this regard, some educators pointed out a sharp problem.

Although the Qing Dynasty has begun a new policy, traditional forces are still very strong in the vast inland areas.

When boys reach the age of eleven or twelve, they become the labor force of the family.

Their parents don't want their children to go to school.

If I had that much time, I might as well reclaim two more acres of land for my family.

If compulsory measures are implemented, it may cause dissatisfaction and backlash among the people.

In the end, it is always the children who get hurt.

For a time, various discussions emerged one after another.

As for Li Qiwei's second suggestion, to open a girls' school, it caused an even greater sensation than the first one.

Although the Qing Dynasty had special schools for girls many years ago, they were all privately established, such as the girls' school run by Wang Jile's mother.

Another type is girls' schools run by foreign missionaries.

In this era, families willing to send their girls to school are basically wealthy families.

He dotes on his daughter and wants her to learn knowledge.

In the eyes of countless ordinary people, letting their daughters go to school is simply the biggest loss-making business.

Because daughters will eventually marry someone else.

What’s the point of studying more?
The view that a woman's virtue lies in her lack of talent is still the mainstream of the times.

Just when everyone was wondering how the court would respond to these two suggestions, Empress Dowager Cixi actually gave a direct order to approve Li Qiwei's memorial.

And urge Li Qiwei to handle all matters as soon as possible.

But at the same time, an additional condition was given: the court would not allocate even a single tael of silver.

This surprised everyone. When did the ignorant Qing Dynasty become so open-minded?

In fact, in real history, in 1907, Cixi agreed to order the promulgation of the "Regulations for Women's Education" in order to enlighten the knowledge of the female community and preserve ethics at the same time.

This may be related to the fact that Cixi was also a woman.

So just a few days later, Li Qiwei came up with a detailed charter.

Temporarily, girls' normal schools and girls' primary schools will be set up in girls' schools, which shall be set up separately from boys' schools and shall not be mixed.

The subjects for teacher training were stipulated as follows: moral education, education, Chinese language, history, geography, arithmetic, drawing, home economics, tailoring, and crafts, etc.

This move sparked heated discussions among the public, and Li Qiwei became the object of worship for all women in the country.

He transformed himself into a fighter for women's rights, working for the welfare of women in the country and calling for gender equality.

If he had not already married, I'm afraid the door of his house would have been squeezed out by the matchmaker.

For a time, the whole society was full of discussions about Li Qiwei.

Seeing that the time was ripe, Li Qiwei submitted another memorial on May 5.

This time it's about donations.

In this memorial, he requested the court to introduce specific donation reward policies.

Guangdong was still used as a pilot province, and the court would grant honorary official titles to those who donated more than 1 taels and less than 2 taels.

For a one-time donation of more than 5 taels, Guangdong Province will name a new primary school after the donor.

The Qing government thought this was a good idea as it did not require the court to spend any money and would also bring the Qing Dynasty a reputation for valuing education.

Why not do it.

So he agreed to Li Qiwei's suggestion without hesitation.

And the scope of the reward is directly set across the country, not just in Guangdong.

The education leaders in every province all applauded and put their utmost efforts into making this happen.

It only costs a few dollars to build a primary school, so the remaining money can be used to fill the gaps in other places.

Nowadays, college is the top priority and has the largest amount owed.

When the news spread, all those rich but unknown people could no longer sit still.

This is a great opportunity to leave your name in history.

A school named after oneself, and it is officially recognized.

For people who are still in the Qing Dynasty, this attraction is fatal.

Many wealthy families are gearing up for the event, and 5 taels is just a drop in the bucket for them.

However, they want someone to take the lead, and who knows whether what the government says is true or false.

On May 5, Shanhe Industrial Group, a well-known domestic private enterprise, donated 20 taels of silver to Guangdong Province in the name of the company.

It also requires that the money must be used for education, and that accounts must be disclosed regularly and subject to supervision.

In response, Guangdong Governor Hu Xianglin first expressed his gratitude to Shanhe Industrial Group.

Then he publicly stated that he would definitely use the money in the field of education.

A dozen days later, a primary school named Shanhe Primary School was built in Guangzhou. Only then did everyone believe that the imperial court was serious this time.

All of a sudden, donations of all kinds came in.

Li Qiwei didn't expect that there were so many rich people.

Donations from Guangdong Province alone reached a staggering 1.5 million taels of silver.

Together with donations from overseas Chinese, the total amount of donations exceeded two million taels of silver.

This made the education officials from other provinces stare blankly.

"My God, education funding can be managed like this."

The bigwigs mobilized their own connections and held various publicity meetings to call on the rich to donate.

At this time, Li Qiwei was sitting alone in the office of the Education Commissioner, looking out the window with a smile.

Compulsory education will be implemented from now on. Even if it encounters great resistance, given the huge population base in the country, the number of students will probably be comparable to the entire population of a European country.

16 years later, this group of children graduated from college.

Add to that the steady stream of students in the next 16 years, and by then the country will have millions of people studying Western scientific knowledge.

There is no other country in the world that can match China's terrifying growth rate.

With Li Qiwei as the leader, domestic education officially began to accelerate.

The rise of China is unstoppable!

(End of this chapter)