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9.33 million
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About 9.33 million students have registered to go to testing sites throughout the country on June 7 and June 8, this year and take the national exams they must pass to gain entrance to college. That is 240,000 fewer than were registered for the exams last year. The number has fallen three years in a row since 2008, when 10.5 million people were registered for the exams. [Full story] [Lower enrollment ] |
China Daily website initiated an online discussion to share the memory of gaokao, the national university entrance examination, with the assistance of t.qq.com, a micro blog service provided by China’s leading Web portal www.qq.com. The discussion starts with the sentence, "I was so nervous on gaokao because..." and it allows readers to tell their stories. |
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A student, deep in thought, catches up on some last-minute revision before the exam at a Beijing middle school on June 7, 2011. [Photo/China Daily] |
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Cities consider giving college aspirants break To allow the students to go about their task in peace, construction sites across the country have been ordered to suspend work at night and at noon on the two days of the exam. The government, at the same time, has lifted rules restricting the number of private cars that can be on the road in Beijing, a place notorious for its heavy traffic. The change will allow parents to get their children to testing sites in the city quickly. [Full story]
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New choice? Students at reform university refuse to take test | ||||||||||
Students at the South University of Science and Technology of China are refusing to take the national college entrance examination.the 45 students at the reform-based school wrote an open letter on the Internet saying the exam was "inappropriate" for them. "It was a major boost for me when I heard the students wrote an open letter challenging the entrance exam," said Zhu Qingshi, president of the unique university. "The students made me feel hopeful about the country's education reform, and they are even more brave than some adults, officials and teachers," Beijing Times quoted Zhu as saying on Monday. [Full story] |
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Decision that changed the course of my life | ||||||||||
I was one of the first few that appeared for the gaokao, or the college entrance exam, in 1977, when it was resumed after the "cultural revolution" (1966-1976). I was 30 then. Nine years of hard labor in rural environs till then had made me, a Beijing native, give up hope of ever returning to a campus, let alone think of being one of the veterans of China Daily. [Full story] |
In big cities across the country, an increasing number of about-to-graduate high school students are heading abroad as a back-up for possible failure in the national college entrance exam, which has often been dubbed as "millions of troops killing for a chance to cross a thin log over a river". In schools across the country, the three-year preparation for the exam usually means round-the-clock studies, endless tests, and mental pressure for students, parents and teachers, says Yin Hang, a Beijinger. "I got tired of all that and I told my parents I want to study happily and peacefully." The mistrust of the current education system is also mirrored in the fact that China had the largest number of overseas students in the world last year, around 1.27 million according to data from the Ministry of Education. |
The first batch of university students after the "cultural revolution" (1966-1976) at a classroom in March 1978. [Photo/Xinhua]
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