Social and economic transformations, which began in China in December 1978, radically changed the life of the whole country. The modernization of the economy and the growth of population welfare were the key results of the reforms, which began 40 years ago under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping. Over the years of the reforms, there are a lot of changes in all spheres of the national economy, including the education system. Throughout the period of “reform and openness”, the priority for the PRC authorities was to maintain high economic growth rates, which allowed the country to compete in the context of globalization. And although the development of the social sphere was not originally a priority task for the country’s authorities, considerable success, including the educational sector, was achieved over the past 40 years. One of the most important achievements is the abolition of tuition fees at the stage of compulsory nine-year education. For a long time, education in primary and secondary schools of the first stage was not available to all representatives of Chinese society. Gradually, the situation began to change. By 2002, the illiteracy rate had dropped to 85 million people, and in 2017, according to official data, this figure was 4.85% of the total population. Over these decades, China has achieved impressive results in the education of a billion people, but there are still many difficulties to overcome on this path.