The vocational education (VE) system in China has been reformed and redeveloped over the past 20 years and now has a rational structure and stages from junior to senior levels that match the industrial sectors and link to regular secondary education. The reform and development of the Chinese VE system was carried out in three stages. The senior secondary VE was reformed beginning in 1980, while active development of the higher education VE system began in 1994. Beginning in 1998, attention was turned to articulation of the VE system to facilitate communication and movement between vocational education and higher education. Today the system of VE in China consists of education in vocational schools and vocational training at three levels. Junior secondary VE schools are located mainly in rural areas where the economy is less developed. In 1999, 900,800 students were in enrolled in 1,319 such schools. The senior secondary level (senior high school) is composed of 3,962 specialized schools, 8,317 high schools, 4,098 skilled worker schools, and 5,165 adult specialized schools (in 1999). Higher vocational education (2-3 years) mainly enrolls students from regular high schools and secondary vocational schools, with courses aimed at the training of practice-oriented and craft-oriented talents. Problems faced by the school-based VE system in China include the following: (1) enterprises don't want to cooperate with the VE system; (2) the quality of VE cannot meet the demands of the labor market; and (3) articulation of the VE system is not well established. Further research is needed to improve the development of VE in China. (KC)