Research On The Evaluation Of The Development Balance Of Compulsory Education In Counties From A Spatial Perspective

Educational equity is the value of the harmonious society and balanced development of compulsory education is a basic way to achieve it. To achieve compulsory education balance in the county is not only the primary task but also a clear timetable and road map to achieve national objectives by State Planning Outline for Medium and Long-term Education Reform and Development (2010-2020) in China adopting the county's management system. At present most studies on balanced development of compulsory education are qualitative and little is quantitative. In the results of those quantitative studies, the balanced measure index is in the exploration stage without recognition and balanced standards are under discussion. Balanced development index of compulsory education in county is extremely rare resulting in the lack of scientific and rational research and especially the research of compulsory education in the county is more lack of methodology. According to researches, the main reasons are:hard to build index system, the immature difference measurement methods, difficult to formulate the balance standards and late start.Based on the literature review, this paper selects the county measurement and evaluation of the balanced development of compulsory education, construct ideas based on the theory of pedagogy and geography, intending to provide measurement and evaluation methodology system for balanced development of compulsory education, including targets, methods, techniques, standards and the general idea. Specifically it establishes the evaluation index system of compulsory education development from the perspective of spatial equilibrium, intends to select different measurement methods and data acquisition techniques, establishes the balance measurement and evaluation standards based on different levels and evaluates the development of compulsory education in county accordingly. This paper takes two regional spatial equilibrium indexes presenting progressive relationship as measurement and evaluation index of balanced development of compulsory education in the county:one index is based on the allocation of resources and the other is distribution of students and the school. The former index evaluates the basic conditions of the external balance development between schools based on allocation of resources; the latter evaluate the equilibrium of the real internal quality among schools based on the phenomenon of school choice.As for allocation of resources in compulsory education, this paper constructs three categories of 16 specific indicators including the education quality indicating index, resource allocation leading index, education funding indemnificatory index, as evaluation of the resource allocation level, resets the index weights based on the integration of AHP and Delphi (weighted individual index level used to calculate the total level and weighted individual index difference used to calculate the total difference), measures differences between single indexes or the overall indexes using the Gini coefficient, variation coefficient, weighted coefficient of variation, weighted coefficient of variation and modified weighed coefficient of variation, disintegrates the total differences into three parts:difference between urban schools, differences between rural schools, differences between urban and rural schools, lastly evaluates of the balance of compulsory education resources allocation in county based on the establishment of the control criteria of resource allocation on different regions and levels (from developed regions to less developed areas) and stages (from 2010 to 2020). as for compulsory education quality balance, the paper constructs evaluation index of the space balance between matriculate and school location using school choosing index and schooling index based on the reality that people adapt the unbalanced education quality by choosing school and the fact that school choice will increase the time cost of students to study, measures the index of space equilibrium level of compulsory education in county, measures differences of the index of space equilibrium level of compulsory education with variation coefficient, evaluates space equilibrium of compulsory education in county by comparing the standards of different regions and levels (from developed regions to less developed areas) and stages (from 2010 to 2020) and thus judge the education quality balance in county indirectly. Based on these things, this paper forms the evaluation system of equilibrium of compulsory education in county including index establishment, difference measurement, balance standard setting, balance evaluation from the point of compulsory education resources allocation and the education quality. The evaluation system can be used to measure and evaluate the balance development of compulsory education in various counties in the following ten years.In order to test the applicability and guidance of the evaluation system of balance development of compulsory education, this paper makes empirical research taking a primary school of Changshu, a county-level administrative region. On the one hand it tests and confirms rationality and operability of the education system; on the other hand it measures and evaluates the balance development of compulsory primary education in Changshu. The study shows that from a view of resources allocation it is relatively balanced, especially in the resources allocation between urban and rural areas, but from a view of the education quality balance is still on a low level. Finally, this paper provides some suggestions to realize balance development of primary compulsory education with high quality primary education according to the status quo of the balance development of compulsory primary education in Changshu:one is to increase the supply of educational resources optimizing the allocation of resources; the other is to promote the balance of education quality and reduce school choosing motivation.The evaluation system in this paper is provided to satisfy the need of the assessment of equilibrium of compulsory education in county. It solves the measurement problem in educational research by means of analytical method of regional spatial differences in geography and technology of regional spatial data acquisition. In particular, it explanatorily solves the difficult problem of evaluating the balance quality of education between schools with measurement and evaluation of regional spatial balance of students making a new geography perspective for study of the balance development of compulsory education.