Chinese Education Dilemma

Friday, October 16th, 2009
by tom xi

China, the country with the biggest population, is sure handling the education issue differently than other countries in the rest of the world. In fact, the Chinese education system has been a popular topic by all different kinds of people through out the world, including people who are receiving these educations. The most of the controversy concentrates on the biggest exam in any Chinese people’s life: the China National College Entrance Exam.

In China, the process of getting into a college is far different from that of any western countries. Here is how it goes without getting into every detail. First, everyone takes a exam when they graduate from high school, and then, that is it. The central education board then scores all the exams and releases the cutoffs for each colleges and if you got a score that is high enough for the college you applied, that’s great, and if you don’t, well, then you don’t go to college. This treatment may seem unreasonable and poorly constructed since the ability to take one specific test does not contribute to the student’s ability to success or to learn during college, however, with over 1.4 billion people, this is the only resolving method that is possible for the students to get results back in 2 or 3 months. If China adopts the US education system, the biggest department at any college will be their admission office.

With this single-exam-for-your-entire-life system in existence, the exam does not effect only high school student, its effects are much deeper. The most obvious and most devastating effect of all is on the last year of high school in China. In the last year of high school in China, people typically don’t learn anything new, everything involves reviewing and people usually sleep about 4 to 5 hours every day just to review for the last six months before the exam. To rescue students from this situation, some very prestigious colleges in China take top students recommended by teachers from top high schools directly, without them having to take the exam. On the surface, this seems to resolve the problem, but what really happens is just the single-exam system gets moved four years earlier and happens during the middle school to high school level, because a prestigious high school gives a much better chance at avoiding the college entrance exam. This same situation just happens over the next lower level and the next. The latest news I have heard is that a kindergarden which admits only 200 students had over 10000 applicants, just because it’s linked to an elementary school that is linked to a middle school that is linked to on of the top high schools in the country.

This college exam not only effects the lower levels, it effects the college as well. As many people have noticed, education in math and science up until the last year of high school in China may be one of the strongest if not the most in the entire world. (thanks to the exam) However, except for some most prestigious colleges (which are extremely well equipped and wonderful to study in), the college education as a whole in China is not considered strong. That is because after the exam, students feels like they are done and don’t put any effort into college. This widely-spread mindset infest not only students, but also teachers who are teaching student with these mind sets, the teachers can’t really do much if their students doesn’t want to learn to start with.

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