On The Systematization Development Of Public Higher Education In California, U.S. (1850-1960)

Mass higher education is the certain trend of modern society, and it is the only way to fulfill the wide and various demands of modern society for the farther development of modern high education. Since the end of the 20th century, we have made remarkable progress on expanding the scale of higher education. The college-going rate has exceeded 20% in China, which marked that China has entered the mass stage of higher education. But on the other hand, China's higher education exposed many problems in the past years. The conflict of the quantity and the quality, the unbalance of the scale and the structure, and the confusion of the function difference, such systematic problems are the main factors that block the development of China's higher education. It is an important prerequisite to deal with such problems for the healthy development of higher education in China.In the process of exploring a modern development model of the mass higher education that suitable for China's conditions, the experiences that California achieved systematic development of public higher education is particularly concerned and learn. Based on A Master Plan for Higher Education in California (1960-1975), it was formed a systematization development model of public higher education system that character with clear function, reasonable structure, enormous enrollment and outstanding quality in California. Such model offered an effective solution for a series of systemic contradictions in California public higher education. On the history, the emergence of California model suffered a long period of deliberation and theoretical exploration. In this paper, I try to generalize the experience of California model on the basis of overview the history of the public higher education in California and then provide some references for higher education reform in China.Based on the contents, this paper is divided into three parts:Part I is the Preface. This part gives some introductions about the background of this research, main studies on California public higher education, the content of this paper, and the value of this research.Part II includes Chapter I to IV. This part focused largely on the comprehensive history of public higher education in California. The mainline of this part is the California's tireless pursuit of the ultimate goal on equality and excellence of higher education. The pursuit process includes four phase:the beginning of California public higher education, the initial attempt at building of the tripartite system, the exploration of systematization development, and the establishment of systematization development model. The other important issue of this part is the formation of the idea of systematization development of public higher education (we call it as "California idea"). Factors improving the formation of California idea include social requirements, reform exploration of higher education, and educational thoughts of some famous educators like Daniel Gilman, Ellwood Cubberley, Benjaming Wheeler, and Clark Kerr.Part III includes Chapter V and Epilogue. Based on Part II, this part attempts to generalize the characters of California public higher education system and the influence on American higher education and that on other counties and regions. Chapter V compares California with three other representative states, and then gives a general picture of California idea. In Epilogue, this paper gives some prospects and suggestions on the future development of higher education in China.