Personal Statement

It is my conviction that the meaning of life does not dwell in the length of time that one can live or the material abundance that one can acquire, but in the richness and the wonderfulness of life itself. With the increase of my age, many things in my life have changed. But one thing remains constant, that is, I will consistently insist on doing what I like to do and hope that my endeavors can be valuable to the life of others. I see this as the only way whereby I can realize the value of my life.

My undergraduate study focused on economics and I achieved remarkable scholastic performance in this field. My GPA is 3.44 (my GRE score is 2020 and TOEFL---- ). For four consecutive years of my undergraduate study, I received scholarships for my distinguished academic performance. Due to my equally prominent performance in extracurricular activities I was conferred on the Outstanding Student in Campus Activities. However, honestly speaking, my real interest lies not in economics, but in education. Ever since I was a primary school student, I had cherished a strong desire for a teaching career exemplified by my teachers. In the actual teaching career that I embarked on upon my graduating from university, I have become increasingly aware that the existing educational conditions in China are far from satisfactory. The backward teaching methodology and the prevailing pedagogical ideology have rendered Chinese education out of place with the modern international development in education. On the macro level, the current education theory and practice in China lag significantly behind advanced countries in the West. For instance, though education via the internet has achieved considerable development in past two years, in practical operation such education has more often than not deteriorated into an extended form of the conventional examination-oriented education instead of a really interactive process. In my personal experience, despite the fact that some of the problems that I have encountered in my teaching career can be solved by consulting relevant technical literature, I have found that the more serious flaws inherent in China's current educational system cannot be worked out easily. Under such circumstances, an advanced program in education becomes necessary.

In this age of information, traditional education, both in its ideology and methodology, has met unprecedented challenge like many other aspects of human existence. Meanwhile, the pursuit for higher levels of educational development and of the quality of life has largely transformed the educational value orientation of the general public. The educational model that is centered around the cognitive and intellectual instruction has been seriously questioned. Greater attention has been devoted t

o the cultivation of well-developed personality and to the ontological status of the individual in education. Such issues as the internal studies of education science, scientific decision-making in education, and meta-education have also been increasingly emphasized upon. There have also been innovations in educational research methodology. The tendency has been to combine modern technology with humanistic research categories and with naturalistic research categories, and to organically integrate qualitative descriptions with quantitative descriptions. It is also important to carry out educational experimentations in which educational predictions are complemented by educational feedbacks. Both the complexity of education and the complexity of human individuals have made the comprehensive application of diverse educational approaches necessary. Those new horizons are what fascinate me.liuxuepaper.com