Guangxi Provincial Teachers College: Its 1932 Opening and the Yanshan Educational Experiment

Plans for Guangxi Provincial Teachers College responded to demands for teacher education and rural educators. In winter 1931, provincial education director Li Renren contacted Tang Xianzhi in Guangzhou and invited him back to Guangxi to organize the school. Tang left his position at Sun Yat-sen University in spring 1932 and returned to Nanning. Drawing on Tao Xingzhi’s Xiaozhuang teacher-training school, he hoped to connect teacher preparation with rural life.

The school was first planned for existing premises in Nanning, then relocated to Xilin Park, also known as Yanshan Garden, south of Guilin. Away from the urban center, the site offered fields for practical teaching. The preparatory team adapted existing garden buildings and added classrooms, dormitories and a dining hall. A two-story teaching building erected in 1933 provided classrooms below and a library and reading room above, gradually concentrating educational facilities.

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In summer 1932, recruitment took place in Guilin, Nanning, Wuzhou and elsewhere. Applicants could be graduates of senior secondary or secondary teacher-training schools, or young people with equivalent education and more than two years’ primary-school service. Of 120 admitted students, 108 arrived. During the two-year course, the school provided food, books and essential living expenses. Graduates were expected to receive provincial appointments as educational administrators or secondary-school teachers.

Classes started in early September. On 12 October, a belated opening and presidential inauguration ceremony was held. Yang Dongchun received the school seal from Li Renren as the first president. Tang Xianzhi’s preparatory role and Yang’s leadership were distinct, as were the beginning of classes and the ceremony. The later commemoration of 12 October as the founding date refers to this public occasion.

The first intake explicitly admitted men and women together. Xie Tingting’s study of Yang’s educational practice describes encouragement for female students to participate in group activities and collective research. Men and women studied, worked and performed labor together. This broadened women’s access to teacher education and carried the institution’s principles into daily classroom and campus life.

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During Tang’s preparations, the curriculum centered on education: introductory education, educational psychology, teaching methods, administration and teaching practice. It also included Chinese, social science, elementary natural science and agriculture. Fieldwork formed part of education: students cultivated assigned plots, reclaimed land and helped build the campus. Agricultural production accompanied academic study in preparation for future rural teaching.

Under Yang, the school placed greater emphasis on education’s relationship with social realities. Alongside teacher-training courses, it offered social development, general Chinese history, political economy, rural economics and world affairs, hiring scholars including Xue Muqiao. Lectures combined with self-study and group discussion. Students made individual study plans, read in the library and discussed questions arising from their work.

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Communal living was intended to develop cooperation. Students helped manage dining, cleaning, sport and publishing, organized self-governing groups and undertook artistic activities and discussions about everyday life. Public provision eased financial burdens while connecting dormitories, the dining hall, classrooms and student organizations as educational settings.

Academic work extended beyond campus. In summer 1933, Yang, Xue and other teachers led rural economic surveys in Guangxi, including investigation of a women’s labor market at Liutang near Guilin. Students related labor and income to questions such as status within families. College publications, wall newspapers and theater later offered further ways to express observations and participate in public discussion. Women’s participation alongside men made coeducation a practice of cooperation as well as an admission policy.

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The founders differed in their educational views. Tang favored social change through rural education and productive knowledge; Yang emphasized political education, collective training and social research. Their disagreements affected faculty and students, and Tang left in 1933. Subsequent intellectual activity conflicted with the Guangxi authorities’ demands, and Yang departed in April 1934.

In 1936, the college merged into Guangxi University as part of its College of Arts and Law. Remaining students and teachers moved into the reorganized institution. Although independent operation lasted only a few years, Yanshan had hosted experiments in recruitment, staffing, curricula and social investigation. This early experience intertwined rural education, teacher preparation and social-science research.

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