2 Chinese institutions violate 'Double Reduction' policy

Beijing: Two training institutions in Beijing violated China's "Double Reduction" policy by offering private tutoring services in academic subjects to preschool children despite President Xi Jinping's attempts to promote the policy.
A notice was issued by the city's special workgroup on "double reduction" which stated that these institutions violated related policies and regulations by offering training in academic subjects, including pinyin spelling, writing, mathematics and calculation, and English for preschool children, Global Times reported. The institutions were ordered to suspend operations and refund the tuition fees.
The notice added that relevant files and evidence of their illegal operations will be transferred to law enforcement departments for further investigation and punishment, local media reported.
A nationwide campaign to strengthen the implementation of the "double reduction" policy has been organized by the Ministry of Education from July 20 to August 30.
Beijing introduced the "Double Reduction" policy in November 2021. It called for reducing students' amount of homework, and for effectively banning after-school training classes, claiming that it will reduce the burden of homework on schoolchildren but on the contrary, it has resulted in the loss of USD 300 billion in China's private tutoring industry, affecting millions of parents and teachers.
The number of offline private tutoring institutions decreased by 92.14 per cent and they had been cut from 124,000 to 9,728, while for online private tutoring institutions, the number decreased by 87.07 per cent to 34 from the previous 263 after the "double reduction" policy was rolled out, the publication reported citing data from the Ministry of Education in February.
International Forum For Rights And Security (IFFRAS) citing experts reported that shutting down the tutoring centers will not reduce the burden on the schoolchildren but the entire education system in China needs to be reformed.
Besides owners and other stakeholders in these firms, the lives of millions of teachers employed with them have also been upended. When the clampdown was announced, China's tutoring sector was worth a massive two trillion yuan, employing nearly 10 million people. Now, as the industry collapses, these workers have become the unfortunate collateral damage.
Many companies got rid of their teachers with meagre severance packages by making stringent rules and pinning the violations on employees. The number of job seekers in the education sector jumped significantly. More than half of these job seekers had already lost their prior positions, becoming vulnerable to being exploited for low wages, IFFRAS citing recruitment site Zhaopin reported.
However, justifying this clampdown, the Chinese government has blamed the private tutoring industry for igniting and fueling an unhealthy rat race.
"Double Reduction" dictates that new tutoring institutions targeting school students will not get necessary approvals from local authorities anymore. Existing institutions will have to restructure themselves as non-profit organizations. (ANI)