Major Educators in the Republic of China
2 min readAn educational democracy was born in the early years of the Republic of China，which is a great event in the intellectual history of Chinese education.Many educators devoted themselves to the great cause in which they tried to make China a strong country.The following are two representative figures：
Cai Yuanpei（1868-1940）was known for his critical evaluation of the Chinese culture that led to the influential May Fourth Movement.He became the Chancellor of Beijing University in 1917.It was during his tenure that he recruited such famous thinkers to the university as Chen Duxiu（1879-1942）and Li Dazhao（1889-1927）.In 1927，he co-founded the National College of Music with a musician，which later became the Shanghai Conservatory of Music.In April 1928，he became the first president of the Academia Sinica.Cai proposed the equal importance of five ways of life:”Virtue，Wisdom，Health，Collectivei and Beauty”.
Tao Xingzhi（1891-1946）was another ssoum monlel wmois lte iw famous educator.In 1927，he founded the world-famous picture 6-6Cai Yualnpei Morning Village Normal School，which was designed not only to train rural teachers in his philosophy，but also to become the center of allpolitical，social and economic activities in an effort to renew the village itself.The experiment was a success，resulting in the improvement of production，living standards，education，economics and security.In July 1937，he founded the renowned Yucai School.Tao spent his whole life promoting mass education.His teaching slogan is that“the educator canteach himself from teaching and obtain knowledge from his labor.”He claimed that one should do hard labor to educate himself，which embodied his mass education theory.
