In The Hybrid Tiger: Secrets of the Extraordinary Success of Asian-American Kids, Quanyu Huang shares his thoughts about the relative strengths and weaknesses of education in China and the United States. After a proper and thorough examination of both styles of education, his conclusion is that students in China at the primary and secondary levels receive an education that is better. In fact, its excellence is peerless in these initial stages of educations [for reasons he thoroughly documents] — rising almost to the level of bizarre.”
However, “At the highest levels of academic and scientific achievement, the very same Chinese-educated students who excelled in the early stages struggle to have any impact at all. In fact, in terms of important postgraduate scientific research, researchers at Chinese universities and institutions have almost entirely failed to contribute anything of note.”
When discussing Amy Chua and her controversial book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, Huang asserts that “her harsh, anachronistic methods are out of date and far outside of what is acceptable and encouraged in mainstream society in China today; it should go without saying that it’s below the standards of most Chinese-American parents.
Yes, yes, I realize that Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother was initially a New York Times bestseller, what “everyone” insisted was a “must read.” For a while, at least, Hua seemed to be accorded lavish praise by all the major print and electronic media. And then real Chinese and Chinese-American mothers began to speak up….
I agree with Huang that Hua’s description of herself as a “Tiger Mother” is self-serving and wholly inappropriate, indeed inaccurate. In terms of the defining characteristics of a real tiger’s motherhood, she is “always unbelievably nice to her kids. Indeed, she’s a pushover! Real tigers coddle their children, exhibiting infinite patience and understanding. Real tigers protect their young; they play with them; they lick and clean them gently and diligently. When her cubs jump on her broad head, back, and stomach, she doesn’t bite or curse at them. She’s patient, allowing her children to play as they see fit.”
I highly recommend Quanyu Huang’s The Hybrid Tiger even if it never was and never will be a New York Times bestseller. I share his hope that it will be possible “to synergistically combine the best aspects of the two traditions [of education in China and in the United States] so as to prepare our children to thrive in the competitive and constantly evolving global landscape in which we now reside.”