In the 1950s, the Ministry of Education restructured the country's institutions of higher learning in the light of the mode of the former Soviet Union. The restructuring focused on the cultivation of people for industrial development and of teachers and had this as its objective: to develop specialized colleges and straighten up and strengthen comprehensive universities. There were 184 institutions of higher learning in China after the restructuring, which can be classified into two categories: comprehensive universities, and independent colleges and specialized schools. A result of the restructuring is that more colleges of science and technology came intoexistence and higher education in remote regions was strengthened.
        After the restructuring, higher education witnessed a period of rapid development. But the "cultural revolution" (1966-1976) wrought serious damages to the country's higher education. It adversely affected the cultivation of more than one million high-level professionals and resulted in a shortage of people with expertise in many industries and trades. In 1976 when the "cultural revolution" (1966-76) came to an end, one of the government's first major decisions was to resume national unified college entrance examinations. Resumption of the examination system led to a gradual restoration of Chinese people's tradition of