National College Entrance Examination
Encyclopedia
The National Higher Education Entrance Examination, or commonly known as Gao Kao, is an academic examination held annually in the mainland
of the People's Republic of China
. This examination is a prerequisite for entrance into almost all higher education institutions at the undergraduate level. It is usually taken by students in their last year of high school
, although there has been no age restriction since 2001.
In 2006, a record high of 9.5 million people applied for tertiary education entry in China. Of these, 8.8 million (93%) are scheduled to take the national entrance exam and 27,600 (0.28%) have been exempted from standardized exams (保送) due to exceptional or special talent. The rest (0.7 million) will take other standardized entrance exams, such as those designed for adult education
students.
The overall mark received by the student is generally a weighted sum of their subject marks. The maximum possible mark varies wildly from year to year and also varies from province to province.
Students from Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and Macau Special Administrative Region remain in their respective educational system before the handover so students in these two places do not participate in the Gao Kao as the universities there retain their own admission procedure for local students. In return, mainland China's universities have a separate procedure for the admission of those students.
, and continued after the foundation of the People's Republic of China
in 1949 until the Cultural Revolution
began in 1966 when the normal pace of the education system and other sectors of life were disrupted.
The unified national college entrance examination in 1952 marked the start of reform of National Matriculation Tests Policies in the newly established PRC. With the implementation of the first Five Year Plan in 1953, the NMTP was further enhanced. After repeated discussions and experiments, the NMTP was eventually set as a fundamental policy system in 1959. From 1958, the college entrance examination system was affected by the Great Leap Forward
Movement. Soon, unified recruitment was replaced by separate recruitment by individual or unified tertiary education institutions. Meanwhile, political censorship on candidate students was enhanced. Since 1962, criticism of the NMT system had become even harsher, because it hurt benefits of the working class. On July 1966, the NMT was officially canceled and substituted by a new admission policy of recommending workers, farmers and soldiers to college. During the next ten years, the Down to the Countryside Movement
, initiated by Mao Zedong
, forced both senior and junior secondary school graduates, the so-called "intellectual youths", to go to the country and work as farmers in the villages. Against the backdrop of world revolution, millions of such young people, some full of religious-like fervor, joined the ranks of farmers, working and living alongside them. However, they were soon disillusioned by the reality of hard conditions in the countryside.
In the early 1970s, Mao Zedong realized that internal political struggle had taken too big a toll on him as well as the nation and decided to resume the operation of universities. However, the students were selected based on political and family backgrounds rather than academic achievements. This practice continued until the death of Mao in September 1976. In late 1977, Deng Xiaoping
, then under Hua Guofeng
, the heir apparent
of Mao, officially resumed the traditional examination based on academics, the National Higher Education Entrance Examination, which has continued to the present day.
The first such examination after the Cultural Revolution took place in late 1977 and was a history-making event. There was no limit on the age and official educational background of examinees. Consequently, most of the hopefuls who had accumulated during the ten years of the Cultural Revolution and many others who simply wanted to try their luck emerged from society for the examination. The youngest were in their early teens and the oldest were in their late thirties. The questions in the examinations were designed by the individual provinces. The total number of candidate students for the national college entrance exam in 1977 was as many as 5.7 million. Although the Ministry of Education
eventually expanded enrollment, adding 63,000 more to the admission quota, the admission ratio of 4.8% was the lowest in the history of the PRC, with only 272,971 students being admitted.
Starting from 1978, the examination was uniformly designed by the Ministry of Education and all the students across the country took the exact same examination.
However, reforms on the content and form of the exam have never stopped, among which the permission for individual provinces to customize their own exams has been the most salient. The Ministry of Education allowed the College Enrollment Office of Shanghai
to employ an independent exam in 1985, which was the beginning of provincial proposition. In the same year, Guangdong
was also permitted to adopt independent proposition. Starting from 2003, Beijing
, Tianjin
, Jiangsu
, and Zhejiang
were allowed to adopt independent propositions. Till now, there have been 16 provinces and municipalities adopting customized exams.
Although today's admission rate is much higher than in 1977, 1978 and before the 1990s, it is still fairly low compared to the availability of higher education in the Western world
. Consequently, the examination is highly competitive, and the prospective examinees and their parents experience enormous pressure. For the majority, it is a watershed that divides two dramatically different lives.
. The National Higher Education Entrance Examination is graded variously across the country. It is arranged at the end of the spring semester and secondary school graduates across the country take the examination simultaneously over a three day period. Prior to 2003, the examination was held in July, but has since been moved to the month of June. This move was made in consideration of the adverse effects of hot weather on students living in southern China and possible flooding during the rainy season in July.
In different places, students list their university or college preferences prior to the exam, after the exam, or after they learnt their scores. The preferences are given in several tiers (including at least early admissions, key universities, regular universities, technical colleges), each of which can contain around 4-6 choices in institution and program. In some places, students list preferences of different tiers at different times. For example, in Shanghai
, students list their preference for early admission, key universities and regular universities prior to the exam, but other colleges after they learned of their scores.
The exam is administered for 2 or 3 days. Three subjects are mandatory everywhere: Chinese
, Mathematics
and a foreign language—usually English
but may also be substituted by Japanese
, Russian
or French
. The other 6 standard subjects are 3 sciences Physics
, Chemistry
, Biology
, and 3 humanities History
, Geography
and Political Education. Applicants to science/engineering or art/humanities programs typically take 1-3 from the respective category. Since the 2000s, an integrated test, science integrated test, humanities integrated test or wider integrated test is introduced in some places. This integrated test may or may not be considered during admission. In addition, some special regional subjects are required or optional in some places. Currently, the actual requirement varies from province to province.
Applicants to some specialist programs are also screened by additional criteria: some art departments (e.g. audition), military and police schools (political screening and physical exam) and some sports programs (tryout).
Scores obtained in the examinations can be used in applying universities outside mainland China. Among all the places, the counterpart Hong Kong is on their top list. In 2007, 7 students with overall highest score in their provinces entered Hong Kong's universities rather than the two major universities in mainland China. In 2010, over 1,200 students entered the 12 local institutions which provide teritary edcuation courses through this examination. In addition, City University of Hong Kong
and Chinese University of Hong Kong
directly participate in the application procedure like other mainland universities.
The examination is essentially the only criterion for tertiary education admissions. A poor performance on the test almost always means giving up on that goal. Students hoping to attend university will spend most of their waking moments studying prior to the exam. If they fail in their first attempt, some of them repeat the last year of high school life and make another attempt the following year. Fear of failing the exam is such an issue that students who can afford to will sometimes go abroad to attend university despite the greater expense - up to 15 - 30 times the cost of an education in China.
province.
since the employment of comprehensive courses.
Province in 2003 (still in use in 2004) after examining other testing systems.
, Henan
province has fewer universities per capita. Therefore, Henan usually receives fewer admission quotas compared with Beijing, which makes a significantly higher position among applicants necessary for a Henan candidate to be admitted by the same university than his Beijing counterpart. The unequal admission schemes for different provinces and regions might intensify competition among examinees from provinces with fewer advanced education resources. For example, Beijing University planned to admit 180 science students from Beijing (with 80,000 candidates in total), but only 38 from Shandong (with 660,000 candidates in total). This is not similar to the practice of regional universities in other countries which receive subsidies from regional governments in addition to or in place of those received from central governments, as universities in China largely depend on state budget rather than local budget. However, this regionally preferential policy does provide subsidies to students from under-developed regions that enjoy limited educational resources, such as Tibet
and Xinjiang
.
The regional discrimination can be proved by disparities exist between ratios among provinces of enrollment of students from a province to the total number of candidate students of the province. In 2010, acceptance rate for students from Beijing
, Shanghai
, Shandong
and Henan
who applied for universities of the first-ranking category were 20.1%, 18%, 7.1% and 3.5% respectively. High acceptance rates are likely to appear in the most and least developed cities and provinces, such as Beijing
, Shanghai
or Qinghai
. In contrast, acceptance rates remain relatively equal among provinces of the average developmental level.
In recent years, varied admission standards have led some families to relocate for the sole purpose of advancing their children's chances of entering university.
In addition, regional discrimination is not only restricted to the ratio for admission. The national college entrance examinations in some regions such as Hubei and Anhui provinces are always more difficult than in Beijing. It is obvious that the biased policy has led to an unfair competition. This point is best illustrated with the example of Hubei Province. For those students who can just reach the admission cutting score for key university in their entrance examination, it is likely for them to be admitted by a much better university if they take the entrance examination held in Beijing, which has now been prohibited.
Through using a different benchmark examination
and a separated admission procedure
when intaking local secondary-education students in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. Since the National Higher Education Entrance Examinations applicants shares the quota of the University Grants Committee
(UGC, the major tertiary education governing body in HKSAR)'s funded degree (While about 30% (1,200 students) of the non-mainstream intakes are come from the mainland mainly through this examination). Some local students in Hong Kong complained that it was unfair to the local applicants since the increasing intake from this examination increases the admission grade of universities. In 2010, more than 5,000 students who met the minimum university entry requirement will end up not being offered by any degree courses from UGC-member institutes even more than 17,000 students achieved it.
, foreign nationals, persons with family origin in Taiwan
, and children of military casualties. Students can also receive bonus marks by achieving high results in academic Olympiads, other science and technology competitions, sporting competitions, as well as "political or moral" distinction.
Some families try to exploit these concessions, especially that for foreign nationals. They emigrate to Vietnam, Singapore, India or other countries in order to give their children less stringent university entrance requirements. This is because the minimum requirement score for international students (students holding a foreign passport) is considerably lower. Some students counterfeit awards, such as sports competition awards and technology project awards.
purportedly prescribing birth control pills to female students whose parents wanted to ensure the girls were not menstruating at the time of examination. Testing pressure, for some critics, has been linked to faintings, increased drop out rates, and even increasing rates of teenage clinical depression
and suicide
.
Mainland China
Mainland China, the Chinese mainland or simply the mainland, is a geopolitical term that refers to the area under the jurisdiction of the People's Republic of China . According to the Taipei-based Mainland Affairs Council, the term excludes the PRC Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and...
of the People's Republic of China
People's Republic of China
China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...
. This examination is a prerequisite for entrance into almost all higher education institutions at the undergraduate level. It is usually taken by students in their last year of high school
High school
High school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....
, although there has been no age restriction since 2001.
In 2006, a record high of 9.5 million people applied for tertiary education entry in China. Of these, 8.8 million (93%) are scheduled to take the national entrance exam and 27,600 (0.28%) have been exempted from standardized exams (保送) due to exceptional or special talent. The rest (0.7 million) will take other standardized entrance exams, such as those designed for adult education
Adult education
Adult education is the practice of teaching and educating adults. Adult education takes place in the workplace, through 'extension' school or 'school of continuing education' . Other learning places include folk high schools, community colleges, and lifelong learning centers...
students.
The overall mark received by the student is generally a weighted sum of their subject marks. The maximum possible mark varies wildly from year to year and also varies from province to province.
Students from Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and Macau Special Administrative Region remain in their respective educational system before the handover so students in these two places do not participate in the Gao Kao as the universities there retain their own admission procedure for local students. In return, mainland China's universities have a separate procedure for the admission of those students.
History
Tertiary education entrance examinations started in the early years when modern universities emerged in ChinaChina
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
, and continued after the foundation of the People's Republic of China
People's Republic of China
China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...
in 1949 until the Cultural Revolution
Cultural Revolution
The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, commonly known as the Cultural Revolution , was a socio-political movement that took place in the People's Republic of China from 1966 through 1976...
began in 1966 when the normal pace of the education system and other sectors of life were disrupted.
The unified national college entrance examination in 1952 marked the start of reform of National Matriculation Tests Policies in the newly established PRC. With the implementation of the first Five Year Plan in 1953, the NMTP was further enhanced. After repeated discussions and experiments, the NMTP was eventually set as a fundamental policy system in 1959. From 1958, the college entrance examination system was affected by the Great Leap Forward
Great Leap Forward
The Great Leap Forward of the People's Republic of China was an economic and social campaign of the Communist Party of China , reflected in planning decisions from 1958 to 1961, which aimed to use China's vast population to rapidly transform the country from an agrarian economy into a modern...
Movement. Soon, unified recruitment was replaced by separate recruitment by individual or unified tertiary education institutions. Meanwhile, political censorship on candidate students was enhanced. Since 1962, criticism of the NMT system had become even harsher, because it hurt benefits of the working class. On July 1966, the NMT was officially canceled and substituted by a new admission policy of recommending workers, farmers and soldiers to college. During the next ten years, the Down to the Countryside Movement
Down to the Countryside Movement
The Down to the Countryside Movement was a policy instituted in the People's Republic of China in the late 1960s and early 1970s. As a result of the anti-bourgeois thinking prevalent during the Cultural Revolution, Mao Zedong declared certain privileged urban youth would be sent to mountainous...
, initiated by Mao Zedong
Mao Zedong
Mao Zedong, also transliterated as Mao Tse-tung , and commonly referred to as Chairman Mao , was a Chinese Communist revolutionary, guerrilla warfare strategist, Marxist political philosopher, and leader of the Chinese Revolution...
, forced both senior and junior secondary school graduates, the so-called "intellectual youths", to go to the country and work as farmers in the villages. Against the backdrop of world revolution, millions of such young people, some full of religious-like fervor, joined the ranks of farmers, working and living alongside them. However, they were soon disillusioned by the reality of hard conditions in the countryside.
In the early 1970s, Mao Zedong realized that internal political struggle had taken too big a toll on him as well as the nation and decided to resume the operation of universities. However, the students were selected based on political and family backgrounds rather than academic achievements. This practice continued until the death of Mao in September 1976. In late 1977, Deng Xiaoping
Deng Xiaoping
Deng Xiaoping was a Chinese politician, statesman, and diplomat. As leader of the Communist Party of China, Deng was a reformer who led China towards a market economy...
, then under Hua Guofeng
Hua Guofeng
Su Zhu, better known by the nom de guerre Hua Guofeng , was Mao Zedong's designated successor as the Paramount Leader of the Communist Party of China and the People's Republic of China. Upon Zhou Enlai's death in 1976, he succeeded Zhou as the second Premier of the People's Republic of China...
, the heir apparent
Heir apparent
An heir apparent or heiress apparent is a person who is first in line of succession and cannot be displaced from inheriting, except by a change in the rules of succession....
of Mao, officially resumed the traditional examination based on academics, the National Higher Education Entrance Examination, which has continued to the present day.
The first such examination after the Cultural Revolution took place in late 1977 and was a history-making event. There was no limit on the age and official educational background of examinees. Consequently, most of the hopefuls who had accumulated during the ten years of the Cultural Revolution and many others who simply wanted to try their luck emerged from society for the examination. The youngest were in their early teens and the oldest were in their late thirties. The questions in the examinations were designed by the individual provinces. The total number of candidate students for the national college entrance exam in 1977 was as many as 5.7 million. Although the Ministry of Education
Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China
The Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China , formerly Ministry of Education, Central People's Government from 1949 to 1954, State Education Commission from 1985 to 1998, is headquartered in Beijing. It is the agency of the State Council which regulates all aspects of the...
eventually expanded enrollment, adding 63,000 more to the admission quota, the admission ratio of 4.8% was the lowest in the history of the PRC, with only 272,971 students being admitted.
Starting from 1978, the examination was uniformly designed by the Ministry of Education and all the students across the country took the exact same examination.
However, reforms on the content and form of the exam have never stopped, among which the permission for individual provinces to customize their own exams has been the most salient. The Ministry of Education allowed the College Enrollment Office of Shanghai
Shanghai
Shanghai is the largest city by population in China and the largest city proper in the world. It is one of the four province-level municipalities in the People's Republic of China, with a total population of over 23 million as of 2010...
to employ an independent exam in 1985, which was the beginning of provincial proposition. In the same year, Guangdong
Guangdong
Guangdong is a province on the South China Sea coast of the People's Republic of China. The province was previously often written with the alternative English name Kwangtung Province...
was also permitted to adopt independent proposition. Starting from 2003, Beijing
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...
, Tianjin
Tianjin
' is a metropolis in northern China and one of the five national central cities of the People's Republic of China. It is governed as a direct-controlled municipality, one of four such designations, and is, thus, under direct administration of the central government...
, Jiangsu
Jiangsu
' is a province of the People's Republic of China, located along the east coast of the country. The name comes from jiang, short for the city of Jiangning , and su, for the city of Suzhou. The abbreviation for this province is "苏" , the second character of its name...
, and Zhejiang
Zhejiang
Zhejiang is an eastern coastal province of the People's Republic of China. The word Zhejiang was the old name of the Qiantang River, which passes through Hangzhou, the provincial capital...
were allowed to adopt independent propositions. Till now, there have been 16 provinces and municipalities adopting customized exams.
Although today's admission rate is much higher than in 1977, 1978 and before the 1990s, it is still fairly low compared to the availability of higher education in the Western world
Western world
The Western world, also known as the West and the Occident , is a term referring to the countries of Western Europe , the countries of the Americas, as well all countries of Northern and Central Europe, Australia and New Zealand...
. Consequently, the examination is highly competitive, and the prospective examinees and their parents experience enormous pressure. For the majority, it is a watershed that divides two dramatically different lives.
Procedure
The National Higher Education Entrance Examination is not uniform across the country, but administered uniformly within each province of China or direct-controlled municipalityDirect-controlled municipality
A direct-controlled municipality is the highest level classification for cities used by unitary state, with status equal to that of the provinces in the respective countries...
. The National Higher Education Entrance Examination is graded variously across the country. It is arranged at the end of the spring semester and secondary school graduates across the country take the examination simultaneously over a three day period. Prior to 2003, the examination was held in July, but has since been moved to the month of June. This move was made in consideration of the adverse effects of hot weather on students living in southern China and possible flooding during the rainy season in July.
In different places, students list their university or college preferences prior to the exam, after the exam, or after they learnt their scores. The preferences are given in several tiers (including at least early admissions, key universities, regular universities, technical colleges), each of which can contain around 4-6 choices in institution and program. In some places, students list preferences of different tiers at different times. For example, in Shanghai
Shanghai
Shanghai is the largest city by population in China and the largest city proper in the world. It is one of the four province-level municipalities in the People's Republic of China, with a total population of over 23 million as of 2010...
, students list their preference for early admission, key universities and regular universities prior to the exam, but other colleges after they learned of their scores.
The exam is administered for 2 or 3 days. Three subjects are mandatory everywhere: Chinese
Chinese language
The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...
, Mathematics
Mathematics
Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...
and a foreign language—usually English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
but may also be substituted by Japanese
Japanese language
is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...
, Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
or French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
. The other 6 standard subjects are 3 sciences Physics
Physics
Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...
, Chemistry
Chemistry
Chemistry is the science of matter, especially its chemical reactions, but also its composition, structure and properties. Chemistry is concerned with atoms and their interactions with other atoms, and particularly with the properties of chemical bonds....
, Biology
Biology
Biology is a natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function, growth, origin, evolution, distribution, and taxonomy. Biology is a vast subject containing many subdivisions, topics, and disciplines...
, and 3 humanities History
History
History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
, Geography
Geography
Geography is the science that studies the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. A literal translation would be "to describe or write about the Earth". The first person to use the word "geography" was Eratosthenes...
and Political Education. Applicants to science/engineering or art/humanities programs typically take 1-3 from the respective category. Since the 2000s, an integrated test, science integrated test, humanities integrated test or wider integrated test is introduced in some places. This integrated test may or may not be considered during admission. In addition, some special regional subjects are required or optional in some places. Currently, the actual requirement varies from province to province.
Applicants to some specialist programs are also screened by additional criteria: some art departments (e.g. audition), military and police schools (political screening and physical exam) and some sports programs (tryout).
Scores obtained in the examinations can be used in applying universities outside mainland China. Among all the places, the counterpart Hong Kong is on their top list. In 2007, 7 students with overall highest score in their provinces entered Hong Kong's universities rather than the two major universities in mainland China. In 2010, over 1,200 students entered the 12 local institutions which provide teritary edcuation courses through this examination. In addition, City University of Hong Kong
City University of Hong Kong
City University of Hong Kong is a comprehensive research university in Hong Kong. It was founded in 1984 as City Polytechnic of Hong Kong and became a fully accredited university in 1994. It has achieved fast growth in recent years and received international recognition for its academic achievements...
and Chinese University of Hong Kong
Chinese University of Hong Kong
The Chinese University of Hong Kong is a research-led university in Hong Kong.CUHK is the only tertiary education institution in Hong Kong with Nobel Prize winners on its faculty, including Chen Ning Yang, James Mirrlees, Robert Alexander Mundell and Charles K. Kao...
directly participate in the application procedure like other mainland universities.
The examination is essentially the only criterion for tertiary education admissions. A poor performance on the test almost always means giving up on that goal. Students hoping to attend university will spend most of their waking moments studying prior to the exam. If they fail in their first attempt, some of them repeat the last year of high school life and make another attempt the following year. Fear of failing the exam is such an issue that students who can afford to will sometimes go abroad to attend university despite the greater expense - up to 15 - 30 times the cost of an education in China.
"3+2" Examination System
- "3" refers to three compulsory subjects, including "Chinese, Mathematics and English". "2" refers to selecting two subjects either from Politics, History or Geography for arts students, or from Biology, Chemistry or Physics for science students.
"3+X" Examination System
As a pilot examination system used in order to promote education system reform, this examination system has been implemented in most parts of the country.- "3" refers to compulsory subjects, including "Chinese, Mathematics and English".
- "X" means that students can choose, according to their own interests, one or two subjects from either arts subjects (Politics, History and Geography), or science subjects (Biology, Physics and Chemistry).
"4+X" Examination System
This system is used after the New Curriculum Reform being employed in GuangdongGuangdong
Guangdong is a province on the South China Sea coast of the People's Republic of China. The province was previously often written with the alternative English name Kwangtung Province...
province.
- "X" means that according to their own interests, candidates can choose one or two subjects either from arts subjects, including Politics, History and Geography (Politics and Geography cannot be chosen simultaneously), or from science subjects, including Biology, Physics and Chemistry (Physics and Biology cannot be chosen simultaneously).
- Chinese and a foreign language are compulsory. Two separate Mathematics tests are designed respectively for arts students and science students.
- In addition to three compulsory subjects and X subject, arts students have to take comprehensive tests of arts, and science students have to take comprehensive tests of science.
"3+1+X" Examination System
This system has been implemented in ShanghaiShanghai
Shanghai is the largest city by population in China and the largest city proper in the world. It is one of the four province-level municipalities in the People's Republic of China, with a total population of over 23 million as of 2010...
since the employment of comprehensive courses.
- "3" refers to three compulsory subjects "Chinese, Mathematics and a foreign language", with 150 scores for each subject.
- "1" refers to one subject that candidates choose according to their own interests and specialty from "Politics, History, Geography, Physics, Chemistry and Biology". This subject accounts 150 scores when admitted by universities and colleges at undergraduate level. The score is not included in the total score when admitted by vocational and technical colleges. Therefore, candidates can give up this subject when applying for colleges at vocational and technical level.
- "X" refers to comprehensive ability test, which is categorized into arts tests and science tests. Arts students can either choose one subject from Politics, History and Geography, or take an arts comprehensive test when giving up "1' subject. Science students can either choose one subject from Physics, Chemistry and Biology, or take a science comprehensive test when giving up "1" subject. Regardless of arts and science categories, all the comprehensive ability tests cover knowledge of six subjects, including Politics, History, Geography, Physics, Chemistry and Biology. In the first volume of the arts test, number of questions related to arts subjects exceeds science questions, and vice versa; the second volume of the two tests are the same.
"3+2+X" Examination System
This is a pilot college entrance examination system implemented by the JiangsuJiangsu
' is a province of the People's Republic of China, located along the east coast of the country. The name comes from jiang, short for the city of Jiangning , and su, for the city of Suzhou. The abbreviation for this province is "苏" , the second character of its name...
Province in 2003 (still in use in 2004) after examining other testing systems.
- "3" refers to three compulsory subjects "Chinese, mathematics and a foreign language."
- "2" refers to choosing two subjects from the following six areas "politics, history, geography, physics, chemistry, biology,"
- "X" refers to a comprehensive science or liberal arts exam, which is not recorded in the total score, only for university admission reference.
"3+X+1" Examination System
This is part of the curriculum reform in China.- "3" refers to Chinese, Mathematics and a foreign language, which are compulsory testing subjects for each candidate.
- "X" means choosing one, according to the students’ interest, of the two comprehensive tests in either sciences or liberal arts.
- "1" refers to a basic proficiency test on skills that high school graduates needs and should have in order to adapt to social life. This college entrance examination system was implemented for the first time in ShandongShandong' is a Province located on the eastern coast of the People's Republic of China. Shandong has played a major role in Chinese history from the beginning of Chinese civilization along the lower reaches of the Yellow River and served as a pivotal cultural and religious site for Taoism, Chinese...
in 2007.
Corruption
Due to the importance placed on this exam, there has been strong pressure to keep the processes transparent and corruption-free. The government's efforts have not been entirely satisfactory. Leaking of exam content, bribery, and other abuses are still being constantly exposed.Independent proposition
Regional imbalance of social and economic development has resulted in disparity in education levels across China, which gives credit to provincial proposition. However, provincial governments have to increase budget on education in order to offset the declining credibility of the exam caused by lack of experienced proposition experts and management personnel, which will, more or less, cause a repetitive investment in human resources, finance or material. Moreover, independent proposition covers regional discrimination generated by huge disparity of cut off scores between different provinces.Regional discrimination
A university usually sets a fixed admission quota for each province, with a higher number of students coming from its home province. As the advanced educational resources (number and quality of universities) are distributed unevenly across China, it is argued that people are being discriminated against during the admission process based on their geographic region. For example, compared to BeijingBeijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...
, Henan
Henan
Henan , is a province of the People's Republic of China, located in the central part of the country. Its one-character abbreviation is "豫" , named after Yuzhou , a Han Dynasty state that included parts of Henan...
province has fewer universities per capita. Therefore, Henan usually receives fewer admission quotas compared with Beijing, which makes a significantly higher position among applicants necessary for a Henan candidate to be admitted by the same university than his Beijing counterpart. The unequal admission schemes for different provinces and regions might intensify competition among examinees from provinces with fewer advanced education resources. For example, Beijing University planned to admit 180 science students from Beijing (with 80,000 candidates in total), but only 38 from Shandong (with 660,000 candidates in total). This is not similar to the practice of regional universities in other countries which receive subsidies from regional governments in addition to or in place of those received from central governments, as universities in China largely depend on state budget rather than local budget. However, this regionally preferential policy does provide subsidies to students from under-developed regions that enjoy limited educational resources, such as Tibet
Tibet
Tibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...
and Xinjiang
Xinjiang
Xinjiang is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China. It is the largest Chinese administrative division and spans over 1.6 million km2...
.
The regional discrimination can be proved by disparities exist between ratios among provinces of enrollment of students from a province to the total number of candidate students of the province. In 2010, acceptance rate for students from Beijing
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...
, Shanghai
Shanghai
Shanghai is the largest city by population in China and the largest city proper in the world. It is one of the four province-level municipalities in the People's Republic of China, with a total population of over 23 million as of 2010...
, Shandong
Shandong
' is a Province located on the eastern coast of the People's Republic of China. Shandong has played a major role in Chinese history from the beginning of Chinese civilization along the lower reaches of the Yellow River and served as a pivotal cultural and religious site for Taoism, Chinese...
and Henan
Henan
Henan , is a province of the People's Republic of China, located in the central part of the country. Its one-character abbreviation is "豫" , named after Yuzhou , a Han Dynasty state that included parts of Henan...
who applied for universities of the first-ranking category were 20.1%, 18%, 7.1% and 3.5% respectively. High acceptance rates are likely to appear in the most and least developed cities and provinces, such as Beijing
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...
, Shanghai
Shanghai
Shanghai is the largest city by population in China and the largest city proper in the world. It is one of the four province-level municipalities in the People's Republic of China, with a total population of over 23 million as of 2010...
or Qinghai
Qinghai
Qinghai ; Oirat Mongolian: ; ; Salar:) is a province of the People's Republic of China, named after Qinghai Lake...
. In contrast, acceptance rates remain relatively equal among provinces of the average developmental level.
In recent years, varied admission standards have led some families to relocate for the sole purpose of advancing their children's chances of entering university.
In addition, regional discrimination is not only restricted to the ratio for admission. The national college entrance examinations in some regions such as Hubei and Anhui provinces are always more difficult than in Beijing. It is obvious that the biased policy has led to an unfair competition. This point is best illustrated with the example of Hubei Province. For those students who can just reach the admission cutting score for key university in their entrance examination, it is likely for them to be admitted by a much better university if they take the entrance examination held in Beijing, which has now been prohibited.
Through using a different benchmark examination
Hong Kong Advanced Level Examination
The Hong Kong Advanced Level Examination , or more commonly known as the A-level, conducted by the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority , is normally taken by senior students at the end of their matriculation in Hong Kong. In 2010, 39,772 candidates entered for the examination...
and a separated admission procedure
Joint University Programmes Admissions System
The Joint University Programmes Admissions System or JUPAS in Hong Kong is a unified system for applying to the nine member institutions for full-time undergraduate programmes. In 2008 admissions, 35,298 students applied for programmes of the nine institutions under this scheme...
when intaking local secondary-education students in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. Since the National Higher Education Entrance Examinations applicants shares the quota of the University Grants Committee
University Grants Committee (Hong Kong)
The University Grants Committee of Hong Kong is an advisory committee responsible for advising the Government of Hong Kong on the development and funding needs of higher education institutions within Hong Kong....
(UGC, the major tertiary education governing body in HKSAR)'s funded degree (While about 30% (1,200 students) of the non-mainstream intakes are come from the mainland mainly through this examination). Some local students in Hong Kong complained that it was unfair to the local applicants since the increasing intake from this examination increases the admission grade of universities. In 2010, more than 5,000 students who met the minimum university entry requirement will end up not being offered by any degree courses from UGC-member institutes even more than 17,000 students achieved it.
Special concessions
There are special concessions for members of ethnic minoritiesEthnic minorities in China
Ethnic minorities in China are the non-Han Chinese population in the People's Republic of China. The People's Republic of China officially recognizes 55 ethnic minority groups within China in addition to the Han majority. As of 2010, the combined population of officially recognised minority...
, foreign nationals, persons with family origin in Taiwan
Taiwan
Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...
, and children of military casualties. Students can also receive bonus marks by achieving high results in academic Olympiads, other science and technology competitions, sporting competitions, as well as "political or moral" distinction.
Some families try to exploit these concessions, especially that for foreign nationals. They emigrate to Vietnam, Singapore, India or other countries in order to give their children less stringent university entrance requirements. This is because the minimum requirement score for international students (students holding a foreign passport) is considerably lower. Some students counterfeit awards, such as sports competition awards and technology project awards.
Psychological pressure
Further and more deep stemming criticisms have been leveled that the testing system is the "most pressure packed examination in the world." Behaviors surrounding the testing period have been extreme under some reports, with doctors in TianjinTianjin
' is a metropolis in northern China and one of the five national central cities of the People's Republic of China. It is governed as a direct-controlled municipality, one of four such designations, and is, thus, under direct administration of the central government...
purportedly prescribing birth control pills to female students whose parents wanted to ensure the girls were not menstruating at the time of examination. Testing pressure, for some critics, has been linked to faintings, increased drop out rates, and even increasing rates of teenage clinical depression
Clinical depression
Major depressive disorder is a mental disorder characterized by an all-encompassing low mood accompanied by low self-esteem, and by loss of interest or pleasure in normally enjoyable activities...
and suicide
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
.
See also
- Higher education in ChinaHigher education in ChinaHigher education in China is continuously growing, changing and developing. There are over 2,000 universities and colleges, with more than six million enrollments in total. China has set up a degree system, including Bachelors, Masters and Doctoral degrees that are open to foreign students...
- List of universities in China
- Education in the People's Republic of ChinaEducation in the People's Republic of ChinaEducation in the People's Republic of China is a state-run system of public education run by the Ministry of Education. All citizens must attend school for at least nine years. The government provides primary education for six years, starting at age six or seven, followed by six years of secondary...
- List of admissions tests
External links
- Ministry of Education
- Test Fever China Today, 2005.
- China's SAT Slate Magazine, June 4, 2008.
- National University Entrance Examination for China, Ji-heng Zhang Translator, Harry Manos, The Physics Teacher March 1994—Volume 32, Issue 3, pp. 187–189
- China Prep PBS documentary on students preparing for China's National Higher Education Entrance Exam