Thousands of Chinese have submitted opinions and recommendations on a draft government blueprint for education reform and development since it was published on Feb. 28.

When the document on medium and long-term national educational reform and development was closed to public submissions on Sunday, the Ministry of Education had received 27,855 items, said a statement on the ministry's website.

Of the total, 8,317 came in the form of e-mails, 1,064 in letters, and the remainder in posts on the message board on the website.

In addition, the work office in charge of the blueprint itself collected 2.49 million recommendations and opinions from media reports and the Internet.

The message board listed 23 areas for public comment, but the two topics of pre-primary education and nine-year compulsory education attracted the most posts, each topping 3,000.

The comments covered a variety of concerns, such as a standard curriculum, lack of funding for rural schools and when to start teaching English.

The work office was still processing the submissions, which would be actively considered in revising the blueprint, said the statement.

The chief concerns in this round of opinion submissions had yet to be identified.

The draft blueprint was opened to public submissions after several revisions based on the first round of extensive public comment in January and February.

The statement said the first round showed most people wanted the reform to solve problems such as unemployment of college graduates and limited access to urban education for children of migrant workers.

The draft blueprint for 2010 to 2020 states it aims to extend education opportunities and raise educational quality as two of its five strategic goals.

(Xinhua News Agency March 30, 2010)