Shibei Middle School: The School Sun Yat-sen Wrote an Inscription For

Basic facts

This section is about a school, not a sight. The school does not receive visitors; please do not linger or take photographs at the school gate.

1915: a "public school", and one sentence that mattered

In 1915 Tang Naikang raised the funds himself to found the private Shibei Public School, beginning with a primary division and making himself principal.

Why did he want to run a school? The sources record only one aim, and put it with great weight:

To recover the right of education in the concessions.

This sentence has to be seen against the geography. Zhabei pressed right up against the northern boundary of the International Settlement; today's Yongxing Road and Baoshan Road area stood then on the edge of the Settlement. Chinese children living here who wanted to go to school inside the Settlement found that the curriculum, the language and even the threshold for admission were not for them to decide. To run one's own primary school meant, most directly, this: that a child's schooling need no longer be begged of others.

First a primary school, then a middle school — Tang Naikang took fourteen years over it: in 1921 a junior division was added, in 1924 a senior division, and in 1929 the school was renamed "Shanghai Shibei Middle School and Its Affiliated Primary School". A primary school grew into a combined middle school, and it took fourteen years.

Two inscriptions, and two men who raised the money

Part of this school's fame comes from two inscriptions:

The first comes down from the tradition of "cultivating talent" traced to the Book of Songs, the second is a phrase from the Analects. One says what a school should do, the other how a teacher should do it.

Running a school costs money, and this part of the record is very concrete:

• when funds were raised to extend the school buildings, help came from Jian Zhaonan, general manager of the Nanyang Brothers Tobacco Company;
• after the school buildings were destroyed in 1932, with the support of his friend Chen Xinzhi, manager of the Bank of Communications, the buildings rebuilt on a loan from the "Sihang Savings Society" were completed in 1933.

The "Sihang" were the four banks behind the later Sihang Warehouse — Zhabei's schools, warehouses and roads often shared the same purses and the same set of names.

"Diligence, Forbearance and Courage": three characters, three sentences

When Tang Naikang founded the school he drew up the School Regulations and the School Motto, giving each of the three characters a sentence of its own:

The three characters start from "oneself" and push outwards step by step: first stand firm oneself, then deal with others, and at last go about one's business. The accompanying requirements were concrete too — refining the feelings, promoting diligence and thrift, encouraging self-government, rousing the will, guiding organisation and training the reason.

He had two other sentences, quoted again and again in the school history ever since:

Adapt to the currents of the times, without being tossed about by them.

In teaching pupils, the first thing is to preserve their innocence.

1932 and 1937: one bombing, one handover

In the January 28 Incident of 1932 the buildings of the Shibei Public School were destroyed.

Tang Naikang did not shut up shop; instead he borrowed money, rented premises and reopened the school; and in 1933, with Chen Xinzhi's support, the buildings rebuilt on a loan from the Sihang Savings Society were completed.

In 1937 the school was deep in debt and had no means to carry on. Tang Naikang handed the whole of the school's property over to the Shanghai Municipal Education Bureau, and the school changed from private to public, taking the name "the Municipal Shibei Middle School".

This is easily read as a "failure". But read it another way: a private school that had run for twenty-two years, whose founder gave it away for nothing so that it might live on. He was 49 that year, and died in 1949 — after the school turned public he in fact had only a few years left to see it.

During the War of Resistance there is another account: that the school was once renamed "Xinbei Middle School". This appears in some encyclopaedia entries and is recorded here for reference.

After 1954: several "first batches"

That merger in 1994 deserves a sentence of its own. What merged in was "Zhabei Middle School" — a school whose very name carried the district's name. Which road it stood on, and how many years it ran in all, are hard to find out fully today; what can be certain is that its name is gone, and the two characters "Zhabei" have also vanished from the administrative map since 2015. The name of a school outlived the name of a district by twenty years.

Two "traditions" on Yongxing Road

Two things about Shibei Middle School today are brought up again and again.

The first is men's volleyball. The school's men's team is a Shanghai high-level second-tier sports team, and in the 1970s and 1980s half the players on the municipal team came from here — an ordinary middle school that once held up a city team.

The second is the student choir. It is a key ensemble of the Shanghai Student Arts Troupe, and has won the gold prize of an international youth arts festival.

There is also a list of alumni, set out again and again in the sources: Wei Rongjue (an acoustician), Ge Jianxiong (a historical geographer) and Xiang Huaicheng (a former Minister of Finance). Three men in three entirely different fields — this is probably "cultivating talent" in its plainest form.

Lineage table

Sources: Tang Naikang's founding of the private Shibei Public School (primary division) in 1915 with funds raised by himself, the addition of a junior division in 1921, the addition of a senior division in 1924, the renaming as "Shanghai Shibei Middle School and Its Affiliated Primary School" in 1929, the change to public status and the name "the Municipal Shibei Middle School" in 1937, its being among the first batch of Shanghai municipal key middle schools in 1954, its being among the first batch of Shanghai's experimental and model senior high schools in 2005, its being among the first batch of Shanghai's schools with distinctive arts provision in 2008, the site of 22,400 square metres, the 30 teaching classes, the nearly 1,100 pupils, the 126 teachers and staff, the "Diligence, Forbearance and Courage" motto, and the men's volleyball team as a Shanghai high-level second-tier sports team, and the student choir as a key ensemble of the Shanghai Student Arts Troupe, are based on the Baidu Baike entry "Shanghai Shibei Middle School" (Grade C) and the Sogou Baike entry "Shanghai Shibei Middle School" (Grade C); Sun Yat-sen's inscription "Cultivating Talent", Cai Yuanpei's inscription "Never Weary of Teaching", the merger of Zhabei Middle School into Shibei Middle School in 1994, the separation of the junior and senior divisions around 1996, the renaming as "Xinbei Middle School" during the War of Resistance, and the alumni Wei Rongjue, Ge Jianxiong and Xiang Huaicheng, are based on the same Sogou Baike entry and on the NetEase reproduction A Look at 15 Century-Old Famous Schools, a Taste of 15 Century-Old Stories (Grade B); Tang Naikang's life (1888–1949, style name Boqi, a native of Wuxing, Zhejiang, a graduate of the Fudan Public School and the Zhejiang Higher School), the aim of "recovering the right of education in the concessions", "diligence to establish oneself, forbearance to love others, courage to conduct affairs", "adapt to the currents of the times, without being tossed about by them" and "in teaching pupils, the first thing is to preserve their innocence", the borrowing of money to rent premises and reopen after the school buildings were destroyed in 1932, the rebuilding in 1933 on a loan from the "Sihang Savings Society" with the support of Chen Xinzhi, manager of the Bank of Communications, and the handing over of the school's property to the Shanghai Municipal Education Bureau in 1937 because of debt, as well as the funding of the fund-raising by Jian Zhaonan, general manager of the Nanyang Brothers Tobacco Company, are based on the Baidu Baike entry "Tang Naikang" (Grade C); the wording of the school spirit, teaching spirit and learning spirit of 1988 is based on the Sogou Baike entry "Shanghai Shibei Middle School" (Grade C). The full bibliography is in Appendix 4.