Developing Northwest China Through Distance Education: Government Policy and Foundation Level Practice

Northwest China has been considered a ?backward? region, with a large and diverse geography, populated with a number of China?s minority nationalities. As a result it faces interesting challenges for education and modernization. In response, the Chinese government has committed large amounts of money and resources to fund the Western Region Development Program. As the Radio and Television Universities (RTVUs) are the premier provider of distance education within China and one of the largest in the world, how the RTVUs are endeavouring to engage in the development of the western regions is worthy of note. Furthermore, while there is literature on the Radio and Television Universities and how they conduct distance education on the east coast of China, little has been written in English to discuss the implementation of the Radio and Television Universities programs in Xinjiang. This book aims to address the gap in the literature by contributing details of foundation level practice in Xinjiang?s RTVUs and to understand how the Radio and Television Universities? distance education courses relate to government policy for the development of the western regions.