According to the Chinese Ministry of Education, as of November 2020, the total number of full-time and part-time registered teachers of ideological and political theory courses in higher education institutions in the country exceeded 100,000, an increase of nearly 60 per cent since 2015. This represents an average annual growth rate of 14.4 per cent. Liu Guiqin, an official with the Ministry of Education, stated that the ideological and political courses in Chinese universities will “deepen the reform and innovation” during the “14th Five-Year Plan” period. It will also further strengthen these courses by focusing on “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era.” Since the 2018 launching of “Marxist theory” as an undergraduate major in universities nationwide and the implementation of the “Special Plan for the Training of Reserve Talent for Ideological and Political Courses in Universities,” the total number of undergraduate, masters, and doctoral students who have the major of “Marxist theory” across the country has exceeded 62,000. In 2019, at a national conference, Xi Jinping, the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, emphasized the importance of ideological and political courses.