In his generation, some students carried homemade cotton backpacks and others used military satchels as book-bags. "Those book-bags were small, and they were divided into two compartments, one for books and one for pens. The bag carried only five or six textbooks, and textbooks were all much thinner then than they are now. If you put Xiao Chen's textbooks in one of those bags, the straps would have snapped."

Former teacher Miss Xie, remembering her class agenda in the 1970s, said: "At that time, we lectured for the first half of class and used the second half for practice. Problems were solved in class, not at home."

However, after 1980, everything changed. Xiao Chen's father, who graduated from middle school in 1982, wrote a government service report about reducing the middle school student's workload. In 1987, the CCP addressed similar issues in thirteen major reports. From 1983 to 1994, the Bureau of Education issued six reports promoting a lightened workload for students.

More and more reports were issued, but the backpacks never got lighter. On one level, the increasing weight of backpacks reflects the mounting importance that students and teachers must place on college entrance examinations.

1995 is thought of as a watershed year for the education system. Wang Baigen, a middle school principle, clearly remembers that in 1992 and 1993, his son's coursework was relaxed, and class ended at 3:30pm. "But after 1995, things worsened, and despite policy to reduce such burdens, the situation became more serious," Wang said. Miss Xie, a former teacher with more than 40 years experience in the field agrees. Still working in 1995, she said, "From that time until my retirement, the lectures and after school courses were incessant."

In 2000, the Ministry of Education issued a report entitled, "On reducing students' overwhelming workload," the 49th report of its kind issued by the National Education Administration Bureau.

Up to summer of 2005, The Beijing Municipal Education Bureau has enforced an "Anti-Extracurricular Tutorials Order," strictly prohibiting supplementary courses in elementary and middle schools and society at large from beginning new courses. They also prohibited elementary and middle school students from matriculating to the next level of supplementary studies. That same year, Beijing, Guangdong, Hebei, Zhejiang, and Jiangsu were only a few of the provinces that issued measures against "secret math classes" and stopped secret academic competitions.

In October 2007, if you visited Beijing's Rendafu Middle School, you probably would have noticed a few tutorial course advertisers at the school gates. One boasts aloud, "Using an all-new home-schooling method, we promise you an A+… The home-school is based just north of Beijing. It was established 11 years ago, and is now comprised of four major bases, 18 study headquarters, over 50 study centers, and over 800 professional teachers. We are also considering setting up an athletic training center."