Equity in Education: A Children’s Rights Perspective on Teacher Education

Introduction

Overall, there are four brief stages of teaching comparative education in China: 1) Saving the nation from subjugation by translating cutting-edge western economic, political and educational books (1894-1911); 2) Enlightening the mass by importing western educational philosophies and educational systems, especially science and democracy (1912-1949); 3) Emulating and importing Russian educational ideology and presentative pedagogies in accord with the dominant Marxism-Leninism then practiced in China (1949-1978); 4) Opening up to international leading educational ideas in the service of the Chinese Reform and Opening Up initiative (1978-2001); 5) Abandoning mechanical, one-sided westernization and cultivating national/local consciousness in response to new problems in the contemporary Chinese society (2001-present).

Children’s Rights and Teacher Education

The most widely ratified international human rights treaty is the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child...