Education has played a major role in China’s long and rich cultural tradition. Throughout much of the imperial period (221 bc-ad 1911), only educated people held positions of social and political leadership. In 124 bc the first state academy was established for training prospective bureaucrats in Confucian learning and the Chinese classics. Historically, however, relatively few Chinese have been able to take the time to learn the complex Chinese writing system and its associated literature. It is estimated that as late as 1949 only 20 percent of China’s population was literate. To the Chinese Communists, this widespread illiteracy was a stumbling block in the promotion of their political programs.