Chapter 1 Introduction -- Chapter 2 A Critical Definition of Zexiao -- Chapter 3 Public Discourses on Zexiao -- Chapter 4 Where there is a policy, there is a countermeasure -- Chapter 5 The Key Schools and Zexiao -- Chapter 6 Competition of Family Background with Local Characteristics -- Chapter 7 Admission to Public Lower Secondary Schools as Social Closures -- Chapter 8 New Solutions for Zexiao -- Chapter 9 Conclusion.

This book explores and interprets discourses and practices in school admissions to public lower secondary education in urban China by utilizing a discourse analysis approach and a case study method. It identifies continuities and changes in discourses shaped by diverse forces in public lower secondary school admissions in the context of China’s social transformation from a profit-driven society to a more equitable society, and elucidates the power relationships among stakeholders in public school admissions by analysing their interplay in the process. More importantly, it exposes how current socio-economic, institutional and educational systems are shaping the engagement of stakeholders in the public school admissions process. It also presents some on-going projects intended to yield new policies and practices for more equitable public secondary education in China in the development stage of the post-2015.