Multiple regions issue notices! Canceling early and late study sessions has become inevitable—how can primary and secondary schools achieve reduced burden without compromised quality?

In spring 2026, a quiet educational reform is unfolding across many primary and secondary schools nationwide. At the start of the new semester, Chengdu Liewu Middle School announced the complete abolition of morning reading for middle school students, with school arrival times adjusted to no earlier than 7:50 a.m.; Huizhou Education Bureau issued strict notices requiring elementary schools to start no earlier than 8:20 a.m.… Multiple regions have successively introduced policies to strictly regulate morning reading and evening self-study times. When the old path of “stacking time” no longer works, what can education rely on to support the future?

The Policy Map Behind Canceling Morning and Evening Self-Study

Since the beginning of 2026, policies canceling or regulating morning and evening self-study sessions have been intensively issued in various provinces and cities, forming a notable wave of reform.

Huizhou City, Guangdong Province is the pioneer of this reform. On February 27, the Huizhou Education Bureau released the “Notice on Further Standardizing the Curriculum Setup and Schedule of Compulsory Education Schools in Our City,” clearly stipulating: non-boarding schools are strictly prohibited from organizing evening self-study. Boarding schools’ evening self-study is limited to no more than two periods, and using self-study time for classes or tutoring is strictly forbidden. Elementary schools start no earlier than 8:20 a.m., middle schools no earlier than 8:00 a.m., and schools are prohibited from covertly requiring students to arrive early for unified teaching activities.

Dongguan City’s policies are even more detailed. The “Dongguan Education 2026 Key Work Plan” released in February explicitly states: elementary schools will cancel unified morning reading; middle schools’ evening self-study generally ends no later than 9:00 p.m.; high schools’ evening self-study generally ends no later than 10:00 p.m.

Nanjing City, Jiangsu Province has not issued formal notices, but the Education Bureau has responded: strictly implementing the Ministry of Education’s requirements that middle school classes generally start no earlier than 8:00 a.m., and schools are not allowed to require students to arrive early for unified educational activities—effectively meaning the cancellation of unified morning reading.

Zhejiang Province is also actively promoting this change. Ningbo’s Qianwan New Area Junior Middle School officially canceled morning reading this spring semester, with students arriving before 8:00 a.m. Meanwhile, all middle schools in Hangzhou have canceled unified morning reading, with class start times no earlier than 8:00 a.m.

Sichuan Province’s Chengdu Liewu Middle School explicitly states in its notice that, to protect students’ physical and mental health and ensure sufficient sleep and breakfast time, all three grades of middle school have fully canceled morning reading, with school arrival times adjusted to no earlier than 7:50 a.m., and classes officially starting at 8:00 a.m. The school also promises “reducing burden without reducing quality,” aiming to “make up” time through optimized classroom teaching and homework design.

These policy measures, on the surface, are comprehensive implementations of the Ministry of Education’s related directives. Deeper logic, however, emphasizes a high regard for students’ physical and mental health and overall development. Previously, many schools scheduled morning reading at 7:30 or even earlier, causing students to go to school in the dark, with common issues of insufficient sleep and hurried breakfasts. Some students appeared drowsy during morning reading, with low learning efficiency. Now, this trend is rapidly reversing.

“Health first”—these four words are the fundamental principle behind this adjustment of schedules.

From “Stacking Time” to “Intelligent Quality Enhancement”: An Inevitable Shift

No morning reading, regulated evening self-study, students gain an extra hour of sleep—does this mean a “quality reduction” in education?

On the contrary, this is a strategic shift toward “reducing burdens without reducing quality”—eliminating inefficient time consumption and enhancing precise teaching effectiveness. When the “race against time” path is blocked by policies, education must find new ways: how to achieve better educational outcomes without overburdening students’ emotional well-being and physical health? The answer points to AI-powered education.

While schools across regions are adjusting schedules, the national level is systematically planning. At the February national key work deployment meeting for basic education, the Ministry of Education emphasized the need to “advance middle school entrance exam reform in an orderly manner and promote artificial intelligence into curriculum standards, daily teaching, and assessment.” Subsequently, Minister Huai Jinpeng stated at the National Two Sessions press conference: “Digitalization is a new opportunity and new track for comprehensive reform of higher education.” This judgment equally applies to basic education.

AI solutions fundamentally involve a systemic reconstruction of teaching efficiency. In classroom teaching, real-time data collection and analysis allow teachers to instantly grasp students’ understanding, adjusting pace at critical points to avoid the entire class wasting time on a few students; in homework, intelligent grading covers objective questions and a significant portion of subjective questions, freeing teachers from repetitive tasks to focus on common issues and individual differences reflected in assignments; in assessment, the accumulation of process data makes each student’s knowledge map visible, enabling targeted follow-up teaching rather than “broad coverage and repeated sweeping.”

This is the true mechanism of “reducing burdens without reducing quality.” What is reduced is inefficient, passive, and homogenized time consumption, while what is added is precise, personalized, data-driven teaching effectiveness. When each student can learn at their own pace and difficulty level, and teachers can truly dedicate time to the parts that require educational wisdom, teaching quality no longer depends on time stacking but on the release of effectiveness.

This reveals the deeper significance behind this transformation. In the era of intelligence, educational reform is not about machines replacing humans but about enabling humans to become better humans. Teachers are liberated from repetitive labor, allowing focus on truly educationally valuable aspects; students are freed from passive rote exercises, discovering themselves through personalized learning.

Focusing on “People,” Rebuilding the School System

The direction is clear: reduce time burdens, enhance intelligent effectiveness. But for frontline schools, the core challenge remains in implementation: when AI is integrated into curriculum standards, teaching, and exams, where should schools and teachers start? This is precisely where professional collaboration is needed.

The “Artificial Intelligence Education School Construction Program” launched by AI Sailor, a subsidiary of Hualing AI Group, is designed to respond to this challenge. The program is rooted in two decades of educational practice by a high-tech group, centered on the “1-2-3-4-5 system model.” In this framework, schools are no longer just physical spaces but “organizations” with intelligent feedback capabilities; classrooms are no longer just interaction spaces between teachers and students but dynamic systems of “teacher-student-AI” collaboration; education no longer stops at knowledge transfer but moves toward whole-process nurturing.

The most prominent feature of the program is prioritizing “empowering people.” For principals, it offers “digital transformation leadership” training to help managers master data analysis and resource optimization, promoting full-scenario intelligent campus governance. For teachers, it acts as an “intelligent assistant,” helping them adjust teaching strategies with AI data analysis, transforming them into creative, “intelligent teachers.” For students, it provides personalized learning path planning, intelligent Q&A, and learning data analysis, truly realizing “smart learning transformation.”

The program always emphasizes “Five Educations Integration” (moral, intellectual, physical, aesthetic, labor) to promote students’ “comprehensive development.” AI is not an isolated technical module but an enabling element integrated into the entire process of moral, intellectual, physical, aesthetic, and labor education. It supports moral cultivation, enriches aesthetic experiences, optimizes sports training feedback… allowing technology to play a nurturing role across all five areas.

From classroom practice, the core product “Sailor Digital Smart Classroom S900” has been applied in dozens of schools in Yunnan and other regions. During lessons, AI continuously records the teaching process, enabling teachers to see in real-time where students have concentrated misunderstandings or where progress is slow, allowing immediate adjustments. Classroom judgments are no longer solely based on experience but are data-driven based on current learning performance.

In the wave of the coming intelligent society, every teacher cannot remain a bystander. Some worry about being replaced; others are anxious about falling behind. But the clear policy signal is: teachers will not be replaced by AI, but teachers who do not use AI may be left behind by the times.

As morning reading is canceled and evening self-study is regulated, the “time dividend” in education is being reclaimed. We need to fill this gap with intelligent efficiency. On this path of transformation, professional collaboration and systemic solutions are becoming the practical choice for more and more schools.