Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe the policy and trends in rural education in China over the past 40 years; and also discuss a number of challenges that are faced by China’s rural school system.Design/methodology/approach: The authors use secondary data on policies and trends over the past 40 years for preschool, primary/junior high school, and high school.Findings: The trends over the past 40 years in all areas of rural schooling have been continually upward and strong. While only a low share of rural children attended preschool in the 1980s, by 2014 more than 90 percent of rural children were attending. The biggest achievement in compulsory education is that the rise in the number of primary students that finish grade 6 and matriculate to junior high school. There also was a steep rise of those going to and completing high school. While the successes in upscaling rural education are absolutely unprecedented, there are still challenges.Research limitations/implications: This is descriptive analysis and there is not causal link established between policies and rural schooling outcomes.Practical implications: The authors illustrate one of the most rapid rises of rural education in history and match the achievements up with the policy efforts of the government. The authors also explore policy priorities that will be needed in the coming years to raise the quality of schooling.Originality/value: This is the first paper that documents both the policies and the empirical trends of the success that China has created in building rural education from preschool to high school during the first 40 years of reform (1978-2018). The paper also documents – drawing on the literature and the own research – the achievements and challenges that China still face in the coming years, including issues of gender, urbanization, early childhood education and health and nutrition of students.

Background: Since China adopted a policy to eliminate rural learning centers, boarding has become an important feature of the current rural student community. However, there is a lack of consensus on the impact of boarding schools on students' cognitive and non-cognitive development. This study investigates the effect of boarding schools on the development of cognitive and non-cognitive abilities of junior high school students in rural northwest China. Methods: Using a sample of 5,660 seventh-grade students from 160 rural junior high schools across 19 counties, we identify a causal relationship between boarding and student abilities with the instrumental variables (IV) approach. Results: The results suggest that boarding positively influences memory and attention, while it has no significant effect on other cognitive abilities such as reasoning, transcription speed, and accuracy. Furthermore, we find no significant association between boarding and the development of non-cognitive skills. Conclusions: Given the widespread prevalence of boarding schools in rural regions, our study highlights the growing importance of improving school management to promote the development of students’ cognitive abilities and integrating the development of non-cognitive or social-emotional abilities into students’ daily routines.

Based on the panel data of 20,594 fourth- and fifth-grade students in the western provinces A and B in China, this paper analyzed the effect of boarding at school on the mental health of students using a combination of the propensity score matching (PSM) and difference-in-differences (DID) methods. The results showed that boarding had no significant effect on the mental health of students, but the tendency of loneliness among boarding school students was increased. Heterogeneity analysis found that fifth-grade students whose parents had both left home to work were more likely to have poorer mental health when boarding. This paper has essential policy significance for guiding rural primary schools to improve the mental health of boarding school students, especially left-behind children.

Background: The depression mood during their second and third trimesters has a negative impact on both the mother and her child. Compared with pregnant women in urban areas, rural pregnant women who are in more disadvantaged situation may have more serious psychological problems. Particular, many rural pregnant women had internal migrant work experience during pregnancy in rural China. It is thus necessary to study the prevalence of depressive symptoms and correlated factors among Chinese northwest rural pregnant women. Methods: This study was conducted from October 2017 to April 2018 and surveyed 1053 pregnant women in the middle and late stages of pregnancy who were registered in rural areas, gave informed consent and did not suffer from cognitive impairment or severe mental illness. Depressive symptoms were evaluated by the Chinese Version of the Short Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-C21). Demographic characteristics, pregnancy characteristics and family factors were obtained through structured questionnaires. This study employed multiple factor logistic regression to analyze the relationship between depressive symptoms and their correlates. Results: The prevalence of depressive symptoms among pregnant women during their second and third trimesters was 16.14% (95%CI 13.92%-18.36%). Higher education levels (OR = 0.50; 95%CI 0.29–0.85) and taking folic acid (OR = 0.59; 95%CI 0.39–0.89) reduced the risk of depression symptoms. The family receiving rural welfare (OR = 1.69; 95%CI 1.04–2.75), migration for work (OR = 1.95; 95%CI 1.03–3.71) and living with both parents and parents-in-law (OR = 2.55; 95%CI 1.09–5.96) increased the risk of depressive symptoms. Conclusions: The prevalence of depressive symptoms among pregnant women during their second and third trimesters in Northwest rural China was 16.14% that was nearly 4 percentage points higher than the average survey result of the pregnant women in developed countries and was higher than the findings in Chinese urban areas. To prevent depression symptoms, it’s essential to early screen and provide folic acid for free when antenatal examination. Moreover, maternal examination files should be established so that wo pay attention to the psychological status of pregnant women who were with low education levels, poor family economic situations, excessive parental burden and who had been migrant workers.

Purpose: The family residence structure serves as a crucial pathway through which the family environment influences adolescents’ development.Methods: Drawing on nationally representative data, this study employs multiple linear regression models and propensity score matching to examine the impact of various family residence structures on adolescents’ non-cognitive abilities. Causal identification is achieved through propensity score matching, while robustness is assessed using methods such as augmented inverse probability weighting and placebo tests. Heterogeneity analysis is conducted based on gender and household registration, aiming to explore the mechanisms by which family residence structure affects adolescents’ non-cognitive abilities.Results: The findings indicate that compared to two-parent co-residence households, three-generation co-residence families have significantly positive effects on emotional stability, conscientiousness, and agreeableness among adolescents. In contrast, skip-generation coresidence families exhibit significant negative effects on emotional stability and agreeableness in adolescents. Further investigation into the underlying mechanisms reveals that parental involvement and family socioeconomic status within three-generation co-residence families positively influence adolescents’ non-cognitive abilities.Conclusion: This study highlights the importance of considering grandparents’ role in adolescent growth and advocates for policy recommendations focusing on enhancing non-cognitive abilities in adolescents from skip-generation co-residence families.