Li Xiaobing and Chen Xinbing: Running Education to the Satisfaction of the People
Education is a vital matter for the country and the Party, holding a foundational, pioneering, and overall status within the general landscape of national development. General Secretary Xi Jinping has pointed out that the education powerhouse we aim to build is a socialist education powerhouse with Chinese characteristics. This determines that our education is, in its essence, education under the leadership of the Party, necessarily possessing distinct political, people-centered, and strategic attributes. Institutions of higher education shoulder the heavy responsibility of the times to serve the construction of a powerful nation and the great cause of national rejuvenation. Whether universities can shoulder this mission and fulfill this heavy responsibility depends keyly on whether leading cadres in universities can establish and practice a correct view of performance (政绩观) [1]—one that moves in the same direction as the Party's educational policy, resonates at the same frequency as national strategic needs, and answers the expectations of the teachers, students, and the masses. The view of performance concerns not only the questions of "what to do, how to do it, and for whom," but also determines the orientation and results of universities in terms of resource allocation, institutional arrangements, and focus of work. By shaping the evaluation system and the mechanisms for incentives and constraints, the view of performance can profoundly affect the underlying logic of school operations and the educational ecosystem. The issue of the view of performance is both a matter of Party spirit cultivation [2], the view of power, and the view of career for university Party committees and leading cadres; it is also a fundamental issue relating to the direction of school operations, development paths, and educational effectiveness.
The Alienation of the View of Performance in the Cause of Education: Hazards That Cannot Be Ignored
Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, China's cause of education has achieved world-renowned successes, and the strategy for an education powerhouse has steadily advanced. At the same time, however, an undercurrent of "alienated views of performance" that pursues short-term effects and superficial prosperity is eroding the fabric of some universities; its harms are far-reaching and must not be ignored. This view of performance simplifies the university’s core mission of "cultivating people for the Party and talents for the country" into a numerical competition for rankings, titles, and resources. It turns the goal of school operation into "advancing positions" on various leaderboards and simplifies developmental achievements into the number of outputs published by teachers and students, the height of journal impact factors, or the amount of research funding obtained. The chain reaction produced by this "metric-only" view of performance is the impetuousness of academic research and the utilitarianism of disciplinary construction. A large number of "short, smooth, and fast" [3] research projects have replaced the "slow work" required to persist over the long term sitting on a cold bench [4]. This not only fails to enhance the ability to tackle "bottleneck" (卡脖子) [5] challenges in key national fields but may even weaken it due to the misallocation of academic resources. The fundamental task of talent cultivation is also diluted within this "worship of academic GDP." These practices and their consequences lead not only to a serious homogenization of university operational directions and a weakening of the capacity for connotative development [6] but, more seriously, to the loss of the university spirit. The university should be a temple for the pursuit of truth, the cultivation of virtue, and the inheritance of civilization; once it is coerced by cold numbers and utilitarian rankings, its unique cultural character and spiritual temperament vanish.
First, on the surface, a distorted view of performance appears as a deviation in the view of power and the view of career; at a deeper level, it reflects a shaking of ideals and beliefs and a dilution of Party spirit cultivation. As a project of "moral governance" (德政工程) that "benefits the present and serves the future," higher education follows the long-term, systemic laws of talent growth, disciplinary construction, and education and teaching; it is a lofty cause that requires one to persist over the long term and exert continuous effort. Without historical patience and strategic resolve, if school management is equated to a "term-of-office project" and school development is alienated into "personal performance," the direction will inevitably drift and methods will become improper. This twisted pursuit of value represents a mistaken understanding of the power and the three major attributes of education conferred by the Party and the state. It places personal gain and loss above the fundamental task of fostering virtue through education (立德树人) [7], and places local and short-term interests above the overall cause. This seriously departs from the original aspiration and founding mission of the Party's educational workers in the New Era, deviates from the socialist direction of school operation, and inflicts incalculable harm on the high-quality development of higher education.
Second, the incomplete governance systems and the less-than-modern levels of governance capacity in some universities have objectively provided institutional space for the breeding and spread of the incorrect view of performance. The development of higher education and the governance of modern universities must persist in and strengthen the Party's overall leadership, promoting the governance of schools according to law and democratic school governance. It must bring the operation of administrative power into the institutional track and place the operation of academic power within the laws of academic development, forming a governance structure with clear powers and responsibilities, rigorous procedures, and vigorous supervision. Therefore, the core of scientific university governance lies in the benign interaction and effective checks and balances between administrative power and academic power, ensuring that academic organizations play a principal role in core affairs such as talent cultivation, disciplinary construction, academic evaluation, and faculty development. However, the deep-seated malady of "administrativization" remains serious in some universities today. The boundaries of administrative power are blurred and its operation is non-standard, which seriously squeezes the operating space of academic power. Some reform measures intended to respect laws, reflect reality, and stimulate vitality are either distorted in practice by "increasing the burden at every level" (层层加码) [8] or are "shelved" and difficult to implement. The failure of scientific and legal decision-making, alongside the imbalance of supervision and accountability mechanisms, has opened the door for "performance projects" (政绩工程) [9] and allowed short-term "profitable" behaviors like academic opportunism and academic fraud to run rampant, objectively encouraging a climate of quick success, impetuousness, and flippancy in academia.
Finally, some excessively quantitative external evaluation systems have caused universities to concentrate their energy more on results with high "visibility," leading to a preference for chasing "hard indicators" that are measurable and quantifiable. The clash between the requirements for high quality and rigid quantitative assessments—superimposed by deviations in subjective understanding, the weakening of Party spirit cultivation, and the catalyst of pursuing "quick performance"—has accelerated the generation and practice of the incorrect view of performance. A uniform, rigid assessment yardstick acts like a massive "magnetic field," strongly attracting universities to converge toward the same "high score" targets, thereby falling into a whirlpool of "involutionary" (内卷化) [10] homogeneous competition. Ultimately, this leads to data indicators overriding the laws of higher education development, even becoming a developmental shackle that is difficult to escape.
Returning to the Essence of Education: Cultivating People for the Party and Talents for the Country
Therefore, to establish and practice the correct view of performance appropriate for higher education in the New Era, we must return to the essence of education, taking "cultivating people for the Party and talents for the country" as the starting point and ultimate goal of all work, and deeply integrating individual ideal pursuits and school development goals into the magnificent cause of national development and ethnic rejuvenation.
First, we must strengthen Party spirit cultivation and seek performance in providing education that satisfies the people. General Secretary Xi Jinping has pointed out that in establishing and practicing a correct view of performance, Party spirit plays the decisive role. Standing on the principles of Party spirit, creating benefits for the people is the greatest performance. For higher education, creating benefits for the people means always producing performance around continuously meeting the needs of the broad masses for better education. The fundamental task of universities is to foster virtue through education, which is also the greatest performance for a university. Therefore, for a university to establish a correct view of performance, it must first solve the fundamental question of "what kind of people to cultivate, how to cultivate them, and for whom." Only by cultivating a large number of "new people of the era" capable of shouldering the great responsibility of national rejuvenation can a university's performance withstand the test of history and the people. As the main front for cultivating people's teachers and the main force in building an education powerhouse, normal universities (师范院校) [11] play an important role in linking higher education with basic education. On the basis of persisting in the Party's overall leadership over the school's cause, normal universities must especially take the cultivation of a high-quality teacher workforce—possessing both political integrity and professional competence and capable of shouldering heavy responsibilities—as their primary performance. This requires that in specific developmental undertakings, they fully respect the laws of teacher education and talent growth, taking the building of the teacher workforce, the cultivation of teacher ethics and professional style, and the quality of talent cultivation as the primary standards for testing the effectiveness of school management. Performance should be reflected through the degree of student growth, the degree of recognition by the people, and the degree of social contribution.
Second, we must keep "the country’s most fundamental interests" (国之大者) [12] in mind and create performance in serving national strategies and economic and social development. A correct view of performance must resonate at the same frequency as the fate of the country and the nation. Universities cannot operate in isolation, nor can they isolate themselves from economic and social development or the cause of the state and the nation. This requires all types of universities to reflect their performance in the actual effectiveness of serving the country, the people, socialism, and modernization in their specific operational practices. School development must be planned within the overall landscape of the Party and state’s cause, actively connecting with major national strategies, regional development needs, and industrial transformation and upgrading requirements. They should demonstrate responsibility and action in basic research, tackling key core technologies, developing an autonomous knowledge system for philosophy and social sciences, public policy research, rural revitalization, and social governance. In truth, whatever the national economic and social development needs, higher education must grasp and promote. For normal universities, this means staying grounded in the main responsibility and business of teacher education, fully utilizing the characteristic advantages of normal education, and focusing continuously on key areas such as basic education reform, regional educational balance, the construction of the rural teacher workforce, the digital transformation of education, student mental health education, and the cultivation of high-quality teachers. This serves to better promote educational equity and the improvement of educational quality, thereby truly playing the important role of a vanguard in building an education powerhouse.
Third, we must improve internal governance and produce performance in resolutely eradicating the chronic malady of the "metric-only theory." The distortion of the view of performance often stems from the misalignment of evaluation subjects and deviations in the evaluation system. On one hand, we must continuously deepen the reform of the internal governance structure of universities to ensure the principal status of teachers and students in school development. As a temple of scholarship and a high ground for talent cultivation, universities must clearly define the boundaries between administrative power and academic power, ensuring the decision-making power of academic institutions such as academic committees and degree evaluation committees in key academic matters like disciplinary construction, academic evaluation, title review, and talent recruitment. At the same time, channels for teachers and students to participate in school governance must be smoothed, guaranteeing their right to know, participate, express, and supervise major school decisions, thus realizing the return of power to the teachers and students. On the other hand, under the guidance of education administrative departments, universities should further deepen the reform of tiered and classified internal assessments. They should accelerate the establishment and improvement of a diversified, long-term internal talent evaluation system oriented toward innovation value, ability, and contribution. This must scientifically evaluate basic research, applied research, teaching research, and management services, while also fully reflecting the unique value of normal universities in education and teaching reform, curriculum construction, educational internships, rural teacher cultivation, educational assistance, and basic education research. Not being coerced by short-term data and not being consumed by metric rankings requires not only scientific governance wisdom but also a strong political resolve to "cultivate people for the Party and talents for the country" and to empower and strengthen the foundations of basic education.
Fourth, we must strengthen the building of the cadre workforce and achieve performance by properly handling the relationship between "conspicuous performance" (显绩) and "latent performance" (潜绩) [13]. Education is an undertaking with a long cycle and slow returns. Establishing a correct view of performance requires university leading cadres to continuously temper the mindset of "success does not have to happen during my term" while fulfilling the responsibility of "I must contribute to the ultimate success." They must overcome short-sighted behaviors that "prize the present over the future," formalism that "prizes quantity over quality," and utilitarian tendencies that "prize metrics over cultivation." They must perform "conspicuous" work that is visible, tangible, and beneficial, such as improving school conditions, increasing income and benefits, and supporting teacher-student development. More importantly, they must perform "latent" work that lays foundations and yields long-term, fundamental benefits, such as optimizing disciplinary layouts, cultivating excellent academic styles, and nurturing university culture. University Party committees must guide member-cadres to continuously improve their ability to view education politically, grasp education within the overall landscape, and manage education in accordance with its laws. The study and education of establishing and practicing a correct view of performance should be incorporated into cadre training, theoretical study center groups of Party committees, and intra-Party political life. It should also be integrated into the entire process of cadre selection and appointment, daily management, and assessment evaluation, so that cadres truly understand what a university "should do, can do, and how to do it well." In the appointment of cadres, priority should be given to those who have deeply cultivated education over the long term, profoundly understand the laws of education, and possess firm educational sentiments. At the same time, through inspections, audits, and democratic evaluations, early signs or tendencies of deviations in the view of performance should be discovered, flagged, and corrected early; those who cause serious consequences must be strictly held accountable.
Fifth, we must deepen evaluation reform and realize performance by returning to the essence of school operation and governance. To establish and practice a correct view of performance, the Ministry of Education and relevant competent departments must play a guiding role as the "baton" at the macro level. On one hand, we must carefully plan and steadily promote the reform and innovation of the university evaluation system, improving classified evaluation mechanisms. This involves significantly increasing the weight of "latent performance" indicators such as the quality of talent cultivation, the effectiveness of fostering virtue through education, the construction of teacher ethics and professional style, contributions to basic research, and serving national strategic needs. This will allow research-oriented, applied, vocational-technical, and teacher-education universities to develop their own characteristics and strive for excellence in their respective tracks. Especially regarding the evaluation of normal universities, the core weight should return to the improvement of teacher education quality and the degree of contribution to basic education. Whether a normal university is well-managed should be judged by how many outstanding teachers it has cultivated who are "willing to go, stay, and teach well" in the central and western regions; by its actual contributions to national basic education curriculum reform, textbook construction, and teacher training; and by the growth and development of its graduates in primary and secondary school teaching positions. On the other hand, we must deepen the "delegating power, improving regulation, and strengthening services" (放管服) [14] reform to further unburden and decompress universities. We must significantly reduce various unnecessary inspections, form-filling, and blind administrative interventions, allowing university managers and researchers to be liberated from the "mountains of documents and seas of meetings" (文山会海) and the "inspection reception and leaderboard chasing," so they can return to the essence of school operation and governance.
The performance of a university lies not in the loudness of its titles, but in its unique contribution to the country and society, in solving the bottleneck problems of economic and social development, and in meeting the realistic expectations of the people. For normal universities, the greatest performance is the continuous provision of high-quality educators for the country's future builders and successors.