Everyone would seek advantages and avoid disadvantages, and scholars were no exception. Teaching in a county with excellent conditions would not be too bad in any aspect of life. Naturally, the treatment would not be bad. The most important thing was that scholars generally did not have a strong enough body. If they did not have enough physical fitness to teach in a mountain village with difficult conditions, it would be difficult for them to persist.
In addition, because the population of many remote mountain villages was too small, there were only a dozen children of suitable age. It was obviously very wasteful to set up a school for these dozen students. If only one teacher was sent, he would have to teach children of different ages at the same time. This pressure was not something that any teacher could bear. Teaching the same content a day and teaching different content naturally had different pressures. Moreover, because the children participating in basic education were too young, they could not be too far away from home. Therefore, it was the most difficult thing to implement basic education in these remote mountain areas. It was a big problem that had to be solved.
There were only a few ways that Ang Lee could think of. The first was to increase the remuneration of the teaching staff in these areas and use the higher income to encourage some scholars to devote themselves to education in remote mountain villages.
The second was to do as much as possible and gather the children in a few villages that were not too far away from each other to teach in one village. This could slightly increase the scale and reduce the waste of teachers.
The third was to appropriately reduce the time of education and set up a mobile school. This mobile school would cycle back and forth between several teaching sites. Each site taught for five days. In this way, six teaching sites could be popularized in a month. If there were three teaching sites, each teaching site could be taught twice a month, increasing the intensity of education.
The last way was to move the people in the remote mountain areas to live together. In this way, the problem of too many students being too spread out would be easily solved.
Among these methods, the simplest was to increase the income of the teaching staff. However, if there were too many teaching staff, the pressure could be imagined. Unless the power of merchants was used to relieve the financial pressure of the imperial court.
The most difficult method was naturally the last one. It was to force the people to live together for the so-called school education. It was very difficult to persuade ordinary people. If it was really forced, it might cause more serious chaos. Therefore, as soon as it was proposed, it was rejected by the professors. As for the simplest way to increase the income of the teaching staff, the professors were more agreeable. However, the extent of the increase was limited and it was unlikely to increase too much. In addition, because the demand for teaching staff was too high, a small increase in the salary of one person would be a large sum of money. It would be better if there were merchants who were willing to help. If there were no merchants who were willing to help, the pressure on the imperial court would be too great. Therefore, whether it could be implemented smoothly mainly depended on how much support the merchants could provide and how much money the imperial court could allocate.
As much as possible, the concentration of the students and the establishment of rural mobile schools was unanimously approved by the professors. They all felt that this idea was very good. Popularizing education knowledge and learning some simple things was not for the sake of obtaining scholarly honors. In this way, there was no urgency. There was no need to go to school every day. It was enough to go to school for ten or five days a month. In this way, it was quite appropriate to set up a mobile school and teach at several teaching sites in rotation.
In addition, it was better to combine these two ideas. First, choose a teaching site in a few neighboring villages as one of the cycling teaching sites. Then, find such teaching sites in other villages. These mobile schools only needed to arrive at these teaching sites on time. The location of these teaching sites naturally had to be in the geographical center of several villages. This way, it would be more convenient for the students to go to school and they would not have to travel too far.
If a teaching site was set up in five villages and a cycle of five days, then a mobile school could radiate to 30 villages. The saving of resources was still very great.
Of course, only these very remote and backward mountainous areas needed to do so. In many plains areas, even a village had a large population. Moreover, the distance between each village was not very far. The number of students in a dozen villages could reach hundreds or thousands. This was already enough to set up a large-scale school. Needless to say, in a county or city, a school could easily reach the scale of more than a thousand students. The utilization of resources was still very high.
In other words, in a county or city, the investment in education seemed to be very large, but the efficiency was very high. In a remote mountainous area, the investment seemed to be very small, but the efficiency was not very high. On the contrary, the waste was relatively large.
This was just like how individual farmers in the future were banned by the imperial court on the grounds that they were polluting the environment. These farmers would appear to be very unconvinced. They would feel that the pollution from their pigs was not big at all. Compared to some large, smelly farms, their pollution was negligible. Therefore, they felt very wronged.
However, what the imperial court considered was the overall benefits. They averaged the amount of pollution on each pig, not the overall amount of pollution. Although the overall pollution of the individual farms was not great, the number of farms was too small. The pollution of a single pig was too great, so the overall benefits were too poor. As such, it was natural that they would be banned.
According to the principle of efficiency, the popularization of education in these remote mountain villages should also be banned. However, education was a great thing that benefited the country and the people. It could not be considered in terms of benefits. No matter how big the cost was, it must be carried out firmly. Even if the efficiency was very low, it had to be carried out. Since it was universal education, no corner and no child should be left out. As long as one was a citizen of the Tang dynasty, he must receive the education of the Tang dynasty. No child was an exception.
In other words, the universal education mentioned by Ang Lee had a certain degree of coercion. It was only a benefit for ordinary children, and it was a benefit that they had to accept, especially in the years of basic education, where they had to participate in learning. The later professional schools could be decided by the children themselves.
After a long and rigorous discussion, Ang Lee instilled all his ideas into these knowledgeable doctors. These scholars had nothing to say and had to support Ang Lee's decision. Moreover, most of the scholars sincerely felt that what Ang Lee said was reasonable. It was indeed not a bad thing for most people to learn some basic common sense. It was absolutely beneficial for the whole country. As long as these people did not bite the bullet to take the imperial examinations, it would not cause too much of an impact on the rich and powerful. This was a good thing that could kill many birds with one stone. What reason did he have to not promote it?
What he said should be done immediately. It was useless to rely on words alone. After persuading these doctors, Ang Lee asked them to persuade their peers and spread the purpose and necessity of promoting education, so that more people would agree with Ang Lee's decision.
As long as most of the doctorates and teaching assistants in the capital agreed, the promotion of comprehensive universal education would be a matter of course. There would be no obstacles in this matter. As long as the leaders held a few meetings, this policy could be finalized.
While the doctors of the Imperial College were promoting Ang Lee's ideas, Ang Lee was not idle. He wanted to personally donate money to support a school for the poor. This school belonged to the imperial court and was under the jurisdiction of the imperial court. However, it did not cost the imperial court a single cent. All the teaching expenses would be paid by Ang Lee. The name of this school would also be decided by Ang Lee. This was Ang Lee's privilege.
Of course, it was impossible to call it Ang Lee School. In ancient society, it was very impolite to call someone by their name. Ang Lee felt that it was not good to use his name and official title. His subordinates said a few names in a row, but Ang Lee shook his head repeatedly. He did not agree with this.
"Assistant Minister Li, the school's plaque has been completed, but we still can't decide the name of the school. What should we do? The craftsmen are all waiting."
One of the subordinates said.
Ang Lee frowned and thought for a long time. Then, he said, "Let's call it School of Telepathy."
"School of Telepathy? This is …"
The subordinate did not realize it for a moment and asked in confusion.
Ang Lee said with a smile, "The so-called School of Telepathy is to congratulate me in advance for the successful completion of the Ten Thousand Mile Telepathy Plan. In the whole Tang dynasty, what is more important than the Ten Thousand Mile Telepathy Plan? Let's call it School of Telepathy. The plaque must be completed as soon as possible, and the school must open as soon as possible. By the way, have you recruited all the new teachers?"
"Assistant Minister Li, don't worry. We have recruited all the people. The first batch has a total of 50 people. There are young scholars, respected seniors, and middle-aged abject scholars. They have all passed the exam. There is no case of making up the numbers."
His subordinate said.
Ang Lee nodded with satisfaction and said, "Remember, although the School of Telepathy is only a school for the poor and only recruits poor students from around the capital, you can't despise the education of the school for this reason. The teachers still have to teach well. You can't allow the situation of holding a post without doing any work to happen."
"Assistant Minister Li, don't worry. I will keep an eye on it. Such a thing will never happen."
His subordinate said solemnly.
However, Ang Lee felt that the best way to let the teachers do their best to educate the children was to take incentive measures. This was the most effective way.
The so-called incentive was to divide the children into different classes to see who could teach better children. Those who taught well would be rewarded, while those who did not teach well would be punished. Taking such measures would inevitably greatly arouse the enthusiasm of these teachers and make them feel a sense of urgency. Thus, they would do their best to teach. Everyone wanted to be rewarded and did not want to be punished. The most important thing was that they would lose face.
"Go and tell these newly recruited teachers that the School of Telepathy will adopt a reward and punishment system. The detailed system will be out soon. If they don't agree, they can leave at any time."
Ang Lee said.
"Yes, Assistant Minister Li. I will go and tell them now."
His subordinate said.
This newly established school was located in the south of the capital, not far from Ang Lee's residence. It was a large abandoned house. It was originally the residence of a businessman, but the businessman went to Luoyang to develop and moved his entire family. However, the house was fixed and could not be moved at all, so it was sold. Ang Lee was very fond of this location, so he bought the house. With such a large house, as long as it was slightly renovated and expanded, it could accommodate thousands of students, or even more.
This was because there was a large yard behind the house. In this yard, a four or five-story cement building could be built. In this way, more children could be accommodated. As for the activities of the students, there was a large open space outside the house. As long as Ang Lee proposed to build a school fully funded by himself, the imperial court would allocate the land next to the school to Ang Lee's school. That was a matter of course.
As long as the land was allocated to the school for free, Ang Lee would immediately ask people to build a wall to connect the open space with the school. After all, for the safety of teaching, the school still had to be closed. Only in this way could the safety of the children be ensured. This open space would also become a place for the children to play. In the future, some dishes could even be planted there so that the children could relax after being tired from studying.
Ang Lee proposed to fully popularize basic education in the Tang dynasty. Moreover, he had thought of all the details clearly. This matter naturally made the headlines of the Tang dynasty newspaper. As a result, the people of the entire capital soon learned about this matter and began to talk about it in the streets.
In a teahouse, several bored businessmen were reading the Tang dynasty newspaper while discussing the matter of universal education.
"Fully popularizing schools and letting all children go to school. Only Assistant Minister Li dares to think and do so!"
"Yes! Many things in the Tang dynasty now, such as the glass thumb ring in my hand, were invented by Assistant Minister Li. It's not a big deal to popularize schools. "
"Is it really necessary to let everyone go to school to study? I think it's a waste, a great waste. "
"In my opinion! In the future, everyone will be scholars. We businessmen will also be scholars. Scholars, farmers, businessmen, and businessmen will all be scholars. What's the point of dividing? Anyway, everyone will be scholars. "
"If everyone is really a scholar, who will farm and who will open a teahouse in the future?"
Listening to the chatter, the manager of the teahouse also came over.
"You can't forget to open a teahouse. When everyone is a scholar in the future, it will naturally be the scholars who farm and the scholars who open teahouses. Do you still need to say it?"
"Scholars farm and scholars open teahouses. Just thinking about it makes me feel funny. It's so funny! They can pull down their faces. "
The manager of the teahouse said with a smile.
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