China’s education crackdown: country’s new family law to ban for-profit home tutoring

Name: Crackdown on private tutoring leaves industry, students and parents drawing a blank
Uploaded: 2021-08-16T15:00:26.000Z
Duration: 3 min 22 s
Description: Crackdown on private tutoring leaves industry, students and parents drawing a blank

China’s upcoming Family Education Facilitation Law will include a ban on for-profit home tutoring

The law will be submitted for a second review at a session of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress this week

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Before China’s crackdown, the country’s K-12 off-campus education market was forecast to reach 730 billion yuan (US$112.6 billion) this year, up from 400 billion yuan in 2020. Photo: Shutterstock

Josh Ye

Published: 11:00pm, 16 Aug 2021Updated: 11:15pm, 16 Aug 2021

China’s upcoming Family Education Facilitation Law, which covers compulsory parenting classes for those with troubled kids, will include a ban on for-profit home tutoring, as Beijing widens its crackdown on the off-campus tutoring industry.

The Standing Committee of the National People‘s Congress (NPC), China’s top legislature, is set to introduce a specific article in the law that will prohibit family education coaching services from conducting for-profit training, according to a statement by committee spokesman Zang Tiewei last Friday.

He said establishments that provide family education services will be categorised as “non-profit family education service organisations”. The article will provide specific penalties for those that operate beyond their remit.

Initially proposed in 2019, the new law was previously called the Family Education Law when its draft was first revealed in January this year. It will be submitted for a second review at a session of the NPC’s standing committee this week, according to Zang.

The proposed update to the Family Education Facilitation Law, according to state media, will plug the loophole through which for-profit tutoring services may disguise themselves as family education coaching providers. Once passed, the law will govern how parents conduct education at home for their children.

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Crackdown on private tutoring leaves industry, students and parents drawing a blank

Efforts to get the Family Education Facilitation Law passed and promulgated comes amid China’s crackdown on the K-12 – referring to kindergarten to 12th grade – off-campus tutoring market in the government’s bid to alleviate the cost of education for families and exert its control through the public education system.