星期五下午3点45分，北京史家胡同小学前的街道上围满了前来接孩子放学的家长[微博]，密集的人群使得仅仅想掉个头的汽车“步履维艰”。

　　High-pressure Chinese education? A crowd in Anhui province waves off a coachload of students on their way to take the nine-hour 'gaokao' college entrance exam Photograph: China Daily/CorbisThe streets surrounding Shijia primary school in Beijing were mobbed by a crowd of parents so dense that cars were obliged to beat a retreat。

　　At 3.45pm on Friday, 11-year-old Zou Tingting, five minutes late, bounded through the school's west gate and into her waiting mother's arms. Tingting's classes were over, but her day was just beginning – she had an hour of homework, plus lessons in ping pong, swimming, art, calligraphy and piano。

　　Tingting's mother, Huang Chunhua, said that, like many Chinese mothers, she once considered Tingting's academic performance her top priority; now she realises the importance of a well-rounded education. "I've seen British curricular materials, and I'm actually kind of jealous," she said. "British teachers guide students to discover things on their own – they don't just feed them the answers, like in China."

　　In recent weeks British parents and educators have been in a panic about the discrepancy between the Chinese education system and the UK's. In December the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) released the 2012 results for its triennial Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) test – a reading, maths and science examination administered to half a million 15-year-olds in 65 countries. Shanghai students topped the rankings; the UK ranked 26th。

　　Next week education minister Elizabeth Truss will lead a "fact-finding mission" to Shanghai to learn the secrets of China's success. She plans to adjust the UK's education policy accordingly。

　　Yet Chinese parents and educators see their own system as corrupt, dehumanising, pressurised and unfair. In fact, many are looking to the west for answers. Huang said that some parents bribe Shijia primary school to admit their children (though she declined to say whether she had done so herself)。

　　Tingting attends an expensive cramming school at weekends, leaving her tired. She will probably have to abandon extracurricular activities in high school to devote more time to the college admission exam, called the gaokao. Many parents consider the gruelling nine-hour test a sorting mechanism that will determine the trajectory of their children's lives。

　　Chinese experts are also less impressed than Truss by the Pisa scores. "Even though Shanghai students scored well on the test, this doesn't mean that Shanghai's education system doesn't have any problems," said Lao Kaisheng, a professor in the education department of Beijing Normal University. "In fact, it's the opposite."

　　As long as China's education system remains vast but resource-constrained, Lao added, its schools will default to testing as a reliable indicator of competence. "The education system here puts a heavy emphasis on rote memorisation, which is great for students' test-taking ability but not for their problem-solving and leadership abilities or their interpersonal skills," he said. "Chinese schools just ignore these things."

　　According to an analysis of the rankings, the children of Shanghai's cleaners and caterers are three years more advanced than UK lawyers' and doctors' children in maths. Yet the figures are an unreliable measure of equality. Although Shanghai's 23 million people make up less than 2% of China's population, its per capita GDP is more than double the national average; its college enrolment rate is four times as high。

　　Furthermore, nearly half of Shanghai's school-age children belong to migrant families and were effectively barred from taking the test: because of China's residence registration system, these students are forced to attend high school in their home provinces, where schools are often debilitatingly understaffed. Although students from 12 provinces took the test in 2009, the government only shared Shanghai's scores。

　　"The OECD has not disclosed if other Chinese provinces secretly took part in the 2012 assessment. Nor have Pisa officials disclosed who selected the provinces that participated," wrote Tom Loveless, an education expert at Harvard University, on a Brookings Institute blog. "There is a lack of transparency surrounding Pisa's relationship with China."

　　Wang Peng, a teacher in Wuhu, a city in Anhui province, said that his school's average class size is significantly larger than most in Shanghai, and that it cannot compete in terms of financial strength. Wang said he makes about £300 a month; teachers in big cities make twice as much. "As far as education methods go, there's not a huge difference [between Wuhu and Shanghai]," he said. "But the general educational environment, and the opportunities that students receive – those are really different."

　　Occasionally, reminders of the system's ruthlessness cause soul-searching. In 2012, pictures of a classroom of Chinese high-school students hooked up to intravenous amino acid drips while studying for the gaokao went viral on social media. Last May two teenagers in Jiangsu killed themselves after "failing to complete homework", according to state media. In 2012, a student emerged from the exam to learn that his mother had died in a car crash 12 days prior; the school and his relatives conspired not to tell him so as to not distract him。

　　Authorities recognise the problem. Last June the government issued guidelines urging schools to focus on students' "moral development", "citizenship" and "ambition" rather than their test scores。

　　Yet solutions remain elusive. One recently retired teacher at a Beijing middle school said she earns extra money by teaching an after-school cramming course called maths olympiad. The programme was designed as an advanced exercise for outstanding maths students。

　　In the late 1990s Beijing authorities barred grade schools from setting entrance exams, and some simply adopted maths olympiad scores as a substitute. Parents began to see the course as required, even if their children were uninterested or under-qualified. Although the education ministry has repeatedly cracked down on maths olympiad instruction, schools maintain the programme under different names, state media reported in 2012. Enrolment figures remain high。

　　"When maths olympiad first started, it had the right idea – it was a programme for students who were really interested," said the teacher, who requested anonymity because of the course's controversial profile. "There are a lot of kids without the ability who go to study this stuff, and it consumes their weekends, and their winter and summer vacations。

　　"These students aren't developing in a healthy way. This shouldn't be allowed to happen."

　　译文：

　　星期五下午3点45分，北京史家胡同小学前的街道上围满了前来接孩子放学的家长，密集的人群使得仅仅想掉个头的汽车“步履维艰”。

　　五分钟后，一个小女孩儿边走边跳出了学校西门投入妈妈的怀抱。她叫邹婷婷(音)，今年11岁。虽然下课了，但还不能休息，她丰富的课余生活才刚刚拉开帷幕：回家后，她先得用一个小时完成家庭作业，然后得学习乒乓球、游泳、美术、书法和钢琴。在周末，她还要参加收费高昂的补习班。满满的安排让她不堪重负。不过，进入高中后她可能要放弃课外活动，全力冲刺高考[微博]。因为在中国家长看来，作为国家选拔人才的主要途径，高考将决定孩子的未来。

　　对于给孩子报这么多兴趣班，像许多其他的中国妈妈一样，婷婷的妈妈黄春华(音)表示，她也曾一度认为孩子的学习成绩是最重要的，但现在才发现全面发展才能适应时代需要。她说：“我曾见过英国的学校课程材料，我特别羡慕他们，而且英国老师会引导学生自己思考问题而不是像中国这样只是灌输标准答案。”

　　然而，让人出乎意料的是，最近英国的父母与教育者们却在中英教育质量的差距而发愁。事情是这样的，每三年一次的国际学生能力评估计划(PISA)会对全球15岁学生的阅读、数学和科学素养进行评估，去年12月，经济合作与发展组织(OECD)公布了2012的评估结果，参测的65个城市中上海全球第一，而英国远远落后，排在第26位。

　　下周，相关研究人员将由英国教育[微博]大臣牵头在上海探寻中国教育成功的秘密，并打算以此作为英国教育政策调整的依据。

　　相矛盾的是，许多中国家长和教育家持有截然相反的观点，他们认为中国的教育落后、非人性、压抑而且不公平，甚至有许多人希望从西方获得拯救中国教育的启示。黄女士透露有些家长甚至通过行贿的方式让孩子进入史家胡同小学(但她本人拒绝告诉记者自己是否这么做过)。

　　同大多数家长一样，对于中国的教育现状，许多专家也并没有因为喜人的评估结果而有所改观。北京师范大学[微博]教育研究院教授劳凯声(音)就说：“虽然上海在PISA评估结果中一马当先，但这并不表示上海的教育是十全十美的。实际上恰恰相反，它暴露了许多问题，中式教育强调死记硬背，这当然有利于提高应试能力，但却忽略了对问题解决、领导等个人能力与技能的培养。”他还补充说，只要中国教育体系不设法改变其拘泥死板的现状，考试就会被默认为最可靠的人才选拔工具。

　　根据评估结果的分析显示，上海清洁工和餐饮服务员孩子的数学水平比英国律师和医生的孩子要高出三个年级以上。当然，这样的分析结论并不可靠，更不能用以比较中英两国的教育水平。首先，虽然上海的人口(2300万)占中国总人口的比例不足2%，但它的人均GDP却是全国平均水平的2倍，而且其大学入学率更是高达4倍。再者，几乎一半上海学龄儿童的户口所在地都不在上海，受政策限制，他们只能回本省读高中，而那些高中经常人手不足。虽然中国有12个省份参加了测试，但政府只提供了上海的成绩作为比较。

　　哈佛大学以为教育专家Tom Loveless在博客上写道：“OECD并没有公布是否有其他中国省份参加了测试，PISA也没有公开参测的省份是由什么人选择的。PISA与中国的关系缺乏透明度。”

　　一位安徽芜湖的老师告诉我们，在他的学校，每个班级的学生人数比上海要多得多，但经济实力跟上海又完全没得比。他每月的工资是300英镑，而大城市里老师的工资起码是他的两倍。他说其实芜湖和上海的教学方法其实都差不多，但两地为学生提供的学习环境和机会却有着天壤之别。

　　不过，近年来一系列由于高压教育机制引发的悲剧引起了人们的关注与反思。2012年，一组某高校全班学生边输液边备战高考的照片在社会媒体曝光；还有消息称一名学生的母亲因车祸去世，为了不让他考试分心，他的亲戚竟然直到事后12天才告诉他这个噩耗；去年五月，据官方媒体报道，有两名学生因为“没有完成家庭作业”自杀；

　　中国政府已经认识到了问题的严重性，去年六月，政府下发的指导方针就提出学校教育应注重学生的“道德培养”、“公民意识”和“崇高理想”，而不仅仅是考试分数。然而，具体的解决方案仍然没有着落。

　　一位退休的北京中学老师向我们透露，她通常靠给学生进行课外奥数培训赚取外快，而奥数其实原本是为那些有着出色数学能力的学生设计的。

　　据媒体报道，20世纪90年代末，北京开始禁止小学设置入学考试，但“上有政策下有对策”，为了取得优质生源，有的学校将奥数测试作为入学考试的替代品，奥数也因此受到家长重视，不管孩子喜不喜欢，适不适合，他们都会给孩子报班学习，由此掀起了奥数辅导的热潮。尽管教育部多次压制，许多学校仍以各种名目保留了这个辅导项目，而且参与辅导的学生人数仍居高不下。

　　一位因为这项课程存在的巨大争议而不愿透露姓名的老师表示：“进行奥数辅导的初衷是好的，它面向的是真正对它有兴趣的学生。然而在实施过程中却变了味，许多并不适合它的孩子被迫进行学习，这既达不到学习的效果也极大程度地占用了他们的休息时间，比如周末和寒暑假。”

　　“这些学生走的是一条被扭曲的发展道路，这种现状亟待改善。”