ChinaUnveilsNational‘AI+Education’PlantoTransformClassroomsby2030

China has unveiled a sweeping national strategy to integrate artificial intelligence into its education system by 2030, targeting everything from personalized tutoring and teacher certification to predicting demographic shifts and reallocating educational resources.

The “AI+ Education” Action Plan, jointly issued by the Ministry of Education and four other government bodies on April 8, outlines a blueprint to deeply embed AI across all levels of learning, from primary schools to lifelong education. By 2030, the government aims to largely establish a vertically and horizontally connected AI education system.

The directive positions education as a primary proving ground for AI, aligning with earlier national mandates, including the Outline of Building a Leading Country in Education (2024-2035) and the State Council’s guidelines on implementing the broader “AI+” action.

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Education’s Department of Science, Technology, and Informatization said the initiative follows a 2025 pilot program that tested AI-driven educational reforms across 17 provinces and municipalities, as well as 18 universities. Eleven regions, including Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangdong, have already rolled out local policies to pioneer AI education applications.

The push comes as nations globally race to harness AI for strategic advantage. The U.S. has rolled out the National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource project and implemented the Genesis Mission to accelerate scientific research and comprehensively strengthen AI investment in education. The European Union has launched the AI Continent Action Plan to upgrade worker skills, while Singapore’s Smart Nation 2.0 initiative focuses on building a future-oriented educational ecosystem through smart terminal applications.

Under the new guidelines, AI knowledge will become a mandatory component of teacher qualification exams and certification. Schools are instructed to offer comprehensive AI courses, while universities will be expected to establish AI as a core general education subject and launch interdisciplinary programs tailored to new technologies and emerging industries.

The strategy addresses distinct goals across educational tiers: sparking curiosity and innovation in basic education, fostering interdisciplinary skills in higher education, driving intelligent transformation in vocational training to meet shifting industrial demands, and ensuring equal access to AI learning in lifelong education.

To ease teacher workloads and enhance instruction, the plan highlights specific use cases, such as developing “smart study companions,” building digital student archives to cater to diverse learning needs, and deploying intelligent teaching systems. Authorities also plan to use AI to forecast population changes and industrial trends, allowing schools to dynamically adjust major offerings and resource distribution. Further applications include automated test generation, smart invigilation, and automated grading.

To support these ambitions, China plans to build a national educational smart computing service platform. The infrastructure will link national computing hubs, tech enterprises, and universities to pool resources. Policymakers aim to establish joint development mechanisms between higher education institutions and primary schools to co-create AI curricula and applications, lowering the barrier to entry for innovation. The government will also promote the construction of future classrooms, future schools, and advanced training centers.

Recognizing potential bottlenecks — such as insufficient computing power, poor data quality, and weak foundational models — the education ministry is adopting an “application-first” approach. It is collaborating with the National Development and Reform Commission to optimize AI infrastructure investment. The government intends to prioritize funding for mature applications and major national tasks to avoid redundant construction and speculative rushes.

Financial backing will draw heavily from the central budget, targeting large-scale infrastructure like AI education testing bases and cross-disciplinary innovation platforms. Crucially, the plan encourages long-term, patient, and strategic capital from both state and private sectors to invest in educational technology innovation, aiming to build a diversified investment mechanism driven by the government and supported by schools and enterprises.

Security remains a focal point. The plan mandates the creation of a safety framework for AI in education, including strict security audits for large language models and standardized testing protocols. Authorities aim to build early warning and emergency response mechanisms for effective prevention of issues such as AI-enabled fraud, academic misconduct, excessive competition in test preparation, and privacy leaks.

Contact editor Lu Zhenhua (zhenhualu@caixin.com)