Abstract: As a basic national education system, education supervision in China has experienced stages of recovery and development since the reform and opening-up. The paths of changes in the education supervision may diverse in the analysis from different dimensions. Based on the agenda-setting dimension, there are top-down and bottom-up paths. Based on value-orientation dimension, there are radical and progressive paths. Based on the causal dimension, there are mandatory and induced paths. During over forty years of reform and opening-up, education supervision has experienced changes from all the three dimensions, and each dimension indicates dual but complimentary characteristics. Additionally, there are kinds of causes for education supervision change and they interact with each other. For the purpose of eliminating the resistance of educational supervision change, administrative status of education supervision should be enhanced further. On the other hand, the continuing learning ability of education supervision organizations should be improved. In the future, education supervision change will keep moving forward on the three dimensions and meet the unique needs from each dimension.

Key words: education supervision system, education reform, basic education system