Schooling for the Future—Aided Education Buildings

Among all types of China’s foreign aid, education and construction aid are the most important in terms of proportion and influence. However, in spite of the significance and China’s indisputable endeavor, researches on both disciplines are still in their infancy. While China's foreign aid has attracted much attention, it has also been controversial internationally and domestically. In contrast, the education aid is universally admired and pursued due to its internationalism and humanitarian. As a far-reaching public welfare undertaking, it is much less likely to trigger anti-sentiment and antipathy in recipient countries, and easier to win respect and praise internationally even if it is cross-regional, cross-national, cross-political, cross-cultural and cross-ideological. This chapter attempts to summarize the various types of aided school buildings through an overview and general comments. The authors analyze key influential factors and design features on representative cases selected from a database of 182 projects on four major types: schools for deprived groups, schools of vocational and police training, schools of politics and diplomacy, and the Confucius Institutes.