Chapter 1

Currently, there are over 27 million rural-to-urban migrant children in China who have migrated from rural villages to urban areas with their parent(s) or relatives without attaining permanent urban residency for the restricted household registration (―Hukou‖) system. The educational issues among migrant children in urban areas have attracted more and more attention from the government and society. This chapter is organized into four sections to review the history, special issues and situation, challenges and recommendations for the schooling of rural migrant children in China. The first section describes the historical aspects of migrant children‘s schooling, including original development, official documents promulgated for education of migrant children, the progress of compulsory education and the efficiency of schooling for migrant children since the 1990s. The second section aims to present some special issues and situations regarding migrant children‘s schooling, which comprises several aspects, such as mobility, family environment, schooling situations of migrant children in public schools and characteristics and conditions of migrant children schools (MCS). The third section summarizes barriers and challenges in the schooling of migrant children by using the existing literature and official reports to describe the inequality of educational opportunity, the challenges of educational placement and the challenges of educational advancement. The final section discusses some practical and policy recommendations to improve the schooling of migrant children, which include reforming the household registration system; implementing policies on educational advancement; strengthening the acceptance of public schools; advancing the schooling enrollment management system; and enhancing regulatory oversight and supports for MCS, thus eliminating stigma and improving parenting skills. * E-mail address: danhualin@bnu.edu.cn Shaobing Su, Cheuk Chi Tam, Lihua Chen et al. 250 1. HISTORICAL ASPECTS OF MIGRANT CHILDREN’S SCHOOLING IN CHINA