
I was driven mad by the Chinese education system - divia
http://en.chinaelections.org/NewsInfo.asp?NewsID=19911
======
ekpyrotic
I hate to be the bearer of bad news but the Chinese education system, coupled
with discipline through fear works. I competed at last year's International
Physics Olympiad (Viet Nam), who won? China, as usual.

China starts preparation for the competition when their participants are just
8; they work ~16 hours a day on physics problems. The result? Winning with
ease. You have, I all presume, read Gladwell's latest book. The Chinese
education system squeezes the 10,000 hours required for expertise in before
the children are 18. I'm currently [one of] the best physics students in the
UK and I'd pay anything to have had an uprising like that, instead mine was
consumed with PC games, and posting on forums.

The evidence I have shown can only be used to defend the proposition that:
"The Chinese education system is best for those students with a natural skill
in certain areas; i.e., physics". It might be argued that while it has these
benefits the negatives - I reference the article in question - might outweigh
the former.

I hate to go all reprogenetic on you. But my argument would go something like
the following:

(1) A productive society is one with experts. (2) Expertise is only
accomplished with relentless practice. (C) The most productive society will be
accomplished if citizens are made to constantly work at their discipline.

There will, of course, be a transition stage in which those that lack real
expertise are weeded out; but, I'm ashamed to say, that seems the most
productive society.

Until then I will carry on working on my physics/philosophy 16 hours a day - I
only wish I'd been forced to start earlier.

~~~
wwalker3
Doing well in the Physics Olympiad is not the same as doing well in physics.

In the Physics Olympiad, you solve simple problems based on well-understood
formulae. In physics, you create new knowledge. It may be telling that China
has won only three physics Nobel prizes, and all three of the winners got
their PhDs in the US.

I admire your dedication to working hard on physics, but I think that
creative, effortful practice is the key, not relentless drill.

~~~
ekpyrotic
Thank you wwalker3 for your keen response; however, I going to have to both
agree and disagree - cliché through it is.

Doing well in the Physics Olympiad is a prerequisite to doing well in physics.
Yes, I agree, creating knowledge requires a creative flare; however, I don't
believe such heights can be achieved without first going through "the
relentless drill". I'll use to example of literature to better illustrate my
point. No doubt Hemingway's precision and restrain in writing was a creative
leap; but that was founded on years of drilling; years of practicing
alternative styles; years of relentless practice. Only then are creative
insights possible.

First comes the drill; then comes the "creative, effortful practice".

~~~
megaduck
Your point is well taken, but "creative, effortful practice" also requires a
foundation of creative and critical thinking. Like physics, critical thinking
is a skill that should be learned and practiced, preferably from a young age
and alongside your other training.

One of the deficiencies in the Chinese educational system is that critical
thinking simply isn't taught. The SOLE focus is consumption and rote
regurgitation of material. I'm currently attending a top university in
Beijing, and one thing I find strange is the incurious nature of many of the
Chinese students. They've simply never been taught how to question things or
contextualize knowledge.

Sure, there are a few highly creative thinkers, but they've had to be entirely
autodidactic.

~~~
kragen
_and one thing I find strange is the incurious nature of many of the ...
students. They've simply never been taught how to question things or
contextualize knowledge._

 _Sure, there are a few highly creative thinkers, but they've had to be
entirely autodidactic._

This sounds like every student body I've ever encountered anywhere in the
world. Do you think the problem is worse in Beijing (what university?) than at
Berkeley or Stanford?

~~~
megaduck
Full disclosure: I'm an American attending Beijing Normal University, but I
have friends (both foreign and Chinese) at Tsinghua and Beida (Beijing
University).

I'll agree with you that most people, everywhere, are incurious. That's not a
China problem, it's a human problem. It's particularly striking, though, at
schools like Beida, Tsinghua, and BNU.

The students at those schools are, quite literally, the best and the brightest
that China has to offer. The selectivity for those schools is astounding, and
your exam scores have to be off the charts. EVERYBODY wants to attend those
schools, so every person at those schools had to beat out tens of thousands of
competitors. They're wicked smart, definitely smarter than me and probably
smarter than you. Driven, too. Think MIT, CalTech, Stanford, Harvard, and then
turn it up a notch.

Despite the aggressive intellect of these students, I often get a feeling
of... intellectual passiveness. I've got to be careful here, because I don't
want to give the impression that people here are stupid or inferior. They're
not. It's just that in conversation I often feel like I'm talking to someone
who's never properly learned how to question things. That's surprising,
especially when I'm talking to someone who is obviously both brilliant and
ambitious.

There's always exceptions, and the cream will always naturally rise to the
top. I'm sure people can produce a ton of counter-examples. Things are also
(slowly) changing, as the internet is producing a new and vibrant intellectual
forum. However, I think that any intellectual "spark" still has to be self-
produced. The Chinese educational system is hostile to it, even at the higher
levels.

------
drinian
You know, I went to a top-tier private school in the US, followed by a top-
tier private university, and I never understood the obsession with getting As
in everything. I certainly wasn't, especially once at university, but I didn't
feel like less of a person.Even in the US, there is a stereotype that Asian
parents drive their kids in a similar manner, although I have never heard of
them treating them like property like this father does. Then there's the cram
schools in Korea and Japan. I have to wonder why that, culturally, seems to be
linked to Asians?

Culturally, though, this is the most disturbing part of the article: _One day
I brought in a book, The Collected Stories of Guy Maupassant, and it was
confiscated. The head teacher said this book was useless in improving my
grades and that these kinds of books only lead students into decadence and
depravation. The next day after class I was flipping through a book of short
essays and it too was confiscated. The head teacher would not even let me
write small articles on my own because she believes that it is a waste of time
to write anything unless it is required by the literature teacher._

One message I was always sent during my education was that the point of
education was to become a whole person, not just to make money; literacy and
humanism were an integral part of that. (I think a couple of Asian kids that I
went to school with ended up in the humanities against their parents' wishes
because of this). That attitude seems to be quite common among hackers as
well. The shells of people that the Chinese system will turn out, if this is
any indication, scare me.

~~~
megaduck
< I have to wonder why that, culturally, seems to be linked to Asians?

I can't speak for other Asian countries, but I know China. From what you
wrote, your experience and the experience of Zhang Rui (the high school
student) couldn't be more different. I've recently had the wonderful and
depressing experience of teaching in rural Chinese high schools, and it was an
eye-opening experience. The pressure and stress on those kids is simply
astounding.

Unfortunately for Zhang Rui, there is probably no more important single event
in his life than taking the University Entrance Examination (高考, or GaoKao).
There are really only two life paths before him, depending on his score.

If Zhang Rui gets a decently high score, then he can attend a large university
in a city like Beijing or Shanghai. He will receive an urban residence permit,
and a small stipend that he can use to live as a student. He'll receive a
degree without much difficulty, and he should be able to get a good job. He
can become a professional, he can go into government, he can become a writer,
he's got a lot of options.

If Zhang Rui gets a low score, then he has few or no options. He lives in a
remarkably poor region, even by Chinese standards, and his father is probably
a peasant farmer (or something close). He's probably also got a rural
registration, so he'll never be legally allowed to leave his village. He can
either follow in his father's impoverished footsteps or become an undocumented
migrant worker, sweating in a factory or hand-mixing concrete on a
construction site.

Those are the choices. Zhang Rui might be able to skip university and still
lead a full and interesting life, but the odds are hugely against it. He'll
have to fight the system until the day he dies.

This is the harsh reality that Zhang Rui is facing, and it helps to put
everything into context. His father and teachers know all these things, and so
it's likely they've boiled it down to a cold binary decision: either little
Zhang gets into university and brings the family out of poverty, or he's
another worthless peasant stuck in Anhui. The only thing that matters is the
score on the GaoKao. It's horrible, but not uncommon.

I sincerely hope that Zhang Rui overcomes the system without losing his soul
(or his life). He sounds creative, strong, and insightful. China could use
more voices like his.

~~~
pg
Are some people in China really not legally allowed to leave their villages?

~~~
rms
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hukou_system#Household_registra...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hukou_system#Household_registration_in_mainland_China)

They can leave but can't legally hold a job without the right work permit.

~~~
megaduck
Thanks for the link, rms. It's a good summary of the situation.

For the Americans here, you can get a quick "gut" feeling for the hukou system
by thinking about the illegal Mexican immigrants in the U.S. Sure, they can go
to any city and find low-wage blue collar work. The odds are also pretty good
that they won't be deported. However, they're always going to be stuck at the
bottom of the heap.

The situation is practically identical for people here in China with an
"agricultural" residence permit. They flock to the cities by the tens of
millions to (illegally) work in factories and do construction work. I see them
every day. It's better pay than plowing fields, but they'll forever be working
dirty, dangerous, low-paying jobs. If they do manage to climb up somehow,
they'll live in constant fear of being discovered.

Going to a university gives you an urban registration, which is arguably even
more important than the degree.

------
bokonist
My favorite theory about why the West and China diverged starting in the 16th
century is that entrepreneurial capitalism thrived in the West. The ambitious
acheived success by finding a competent master, learning a trade, and then
making stuff people wanted, whether that be clocks or caravels. In China, the
ambitious were sucked into the civil service exam system. They were judged by
arbitrary tests rather than by producing useful things. The result was
centuries of stagnation.

~~~
whacked_new
> The result was centuries of stagnation.

One of the factors, yes, but making such an attribution overlooks a lot: the
Tang is often regarded as a renaissance in China. It follows the Sui, when the
imperial exams started. General characteristics of each of the dynasties, and
each of the rulers, have large effects on the policies and the culture of the
era.

Simple example: if Bush was an emperor, and held power for a few generations,
it isn't far fetched to see a dark age of bio research.

~~~
f3lix
"if Bush was an emperor, and held power for a few generations, it isn't far
fetched to see a dark age of bio research."

The total federal research and development budget increased under Bush. The
objection that some people have is his moratorium on _federal funding_ of
embryonic stem cell research.

This is a small part of all bio research that is morally contentious. I doubt
your assertion of seeing a "dark age of bio research" is warranted.

~~~
whacked_new
I do admit a great bias in favor of stem cell research and consider it the new
frontier. But "morally contentious" is highly subjective, whereas the
applicability of bio research is not. That is also to say that you have more
wiggle room in interpreting what is contentious research, whereas research
results have no wiggle room (well, there is for bio, but there is always the
option of disproving something).

Which means that it is easy to muddle the issues by drawing hazy borders
around themes that vary from person to person, which is likely a source of
impediment for bio research. Therefore, it isn't far fetched, at all. Funding
is certainly good, but restricting what areas can be done, or even having a
say in it, when it comes to pure research, is not helpful.

But, I am not very educated about these policies and you do make a good point.
This is just a mostly personal interpretation of it, which I believe has a
good likelihood :)

------
DenisM
He seems to have more problems with his relatives than the education system.
However if this sort of treatment is culturally prevalent I can see this
easily holding back the whole country - humans are fragile and fine
instruments and perform at peak only when maintaned with utmost care.

~~~
carterschonwald
miniature versions of this happen in american high schools (especially magnet
high schoos), where the children of recent immigrants will have to deal with a
parent being angry if they do not get A/A+'s in their coursework.

~~~
vicaya
Again it usually happens when parents are not well educated. They only realize
the importance of education, but they're not educated enough to evaluate their
children's progress, so they often have to rely on the not always reliable
association of good grades with good progress.

~~~
Shamiq
Both my parents have post-graduate degrees and have told me one thing
repeatedly:

Shamiq, we know how important it is to learn, but the only way anyone is going
to look beyond your skin color is if your scores are so superior, if your
skills are so superior, if everything is so much better than the number 2 that
they'd be shooting themselves in the foot if they don't hire you.

But the main focus has always been grades and scores.

~~~
endtime
_Shamiq, we know how important it is to learn, but the only way anyone is
going to look beyond your skin color is if your scores are so superior, if
your skills are so superior, if everything is so much better than the number 2
that they'd be shooting themselves in the foot if they don't hire you._

If you don't mind my asking, where do you live?

~~~
Shamiq
Currently in Evanston, IL. Before that in Texas.

~~~
endtime
Do you feel that people in IL or TX are still that racist? Or are you old
enough that when your parents were saying that it was a long time ago? I
haven't lived in either part of the country but I'd be surprised if it's
really still like that.

~~~
Shamiq
Both my parents and I are immigrants, and where they came from they were the
minority. As such, they personally encountered and had to deal with both
racism and xenophobia. It's more subtle in their professional fields, but not
nonexistent.

Parts of Texas are still horrible, but Northwestern is amazing when it comes
with dealing with diversity.

I have carried with me the work ethic springing from their statements, but
tend to ignore the ill will that inspired it. It's useful to learn how to work
hard.

------
thinkcomp
It's really depressing to read articles like this, partly because it does seem
like there's no way out when you're in the middle of it, and partly because
there are significant parts of the American educational system that are really
little better. I did not have abusive parents or extended family members, and
I did not have to endure the suffering that this author did in a far-away
boarding school, but I certainly can relate to the notion of school being a
prison. The idea of teaching to tests is really damaging, and it's unfortunate
that the past eight years in the United States anyway have focused educational
policy on testing scores alone.

~~~
mattmaroon
Test scores are like democracy, they're the least bad option. There's simply
not a better way to measure progress, or one more accurate to life.

~~~
Rabidmonkey1
I'm not sure I agree with this sentiment. Surely there must be a better way to
show proficiency in something besides testing (in the conventional sense).

Besides, the US isn't a Democracy, it's a Republic, albiet a democratic one.
The founders really hated the word and made sure it wasn't in any of the
founding documents.

"Democracy: A government of the masses. Authority derived through mass meeting
or any form of direct expression. Results in mobocracy. Attitude toward
property is communistic negating property rights. Attitude toward law is that
the will of the majority shall regulate, whether it is based upon deliberation
or governed by passion, prejudice, and impulse, without restraint or regard
for consequences. Results in demagogism, license, agitation, discontent,
anarchy."

-1928 U.S. Army Training Manual

~~~
whacked_new
There are better ways, but when your objective is to be quick, at the expense
of accuracy, tests are the "generally accepted" method.

If you don't want to sacrifice accuracy, I think the answer lies in
neuroscience :)

------
tigerthink
I have always believed that to be successful intellectually, you should be
driven by curiosity rather than fear.

~~~
azharcs
I really liked your quote, I have just quoted you in my new blog post about
the same topic. [http://geeyk.com/what-is-wrong-with-chinese-and-indian-
paren...](http://geeyk.com/what-is-wrong-with-chinese-and-indian-parents/)

ps: I didn't link here to drive traffic to my blog post, The comment i have
written on here is the same i have posted there. :)

~~~
tigerthink
Thanks!

For posterity's sake I should probably clarify that I haven't _always_
believed it. It's just something I started saying to myself a year or so ago.

------
Ras_
In Finland, we have the exact opposite. When tuition is universally free
(actually you get paid to study, because government has allotted a student
benefit for 55 months in third tier studies for everyone) from 1st grade to
doctorate studies, some tend to wander - even for years - doing community work
in student unions, or change majors, read another MSc, searching themselves...

Just too many choices and the only opportunity cost is lost time. But it seems
to work, at least according to PISA studies.

(we do have entrance exams for universities, and getting private tuition is
quite common when people try to get accepted into Med or Law studies - but not
for most fields)

------
azharcs
After reading this article, All I can say is Indian education is very much
identical. Some kids here are pushed even more than this Chinese kid; a kid
sister of my friend goes to private tuition so that she could pass the
entrance test of another private tuition which takes in less students and
trains them to write and pass the entrance exam of a reputed college in India
(so in simple words, she is going through two levels of tuitions to get into
another tuition which she might go 4-5 years later).

Every other week I read in newspaper that a school or college kid killed
himself/herself because they failed or got lesser marks than their peers. The
most recent I read was a girl killed herself because she got 4 marks lesser
than the topper of her class. It is scary and it is only getting worse day by
day.

I have actually thought a lot about the reason “Why Parents are pushing their
kids to the wall”, it is certainly not job uncertainty (there are plenty of
outsourced jobs here and you can see almost anyone who is slightly not
retarded getting one). The only answer I got was “Most of the parents in
third-world countries lack good Identities” because they are in some jobs
which are not very happy or proud of and the only way for them to escape from
their ‘past or present’ is to change their future which they think is in the
hands of their kids and not theirs. They constantly hear of stories of kids
who studied well, got a job in some company and bought his parents house
(which if he/she is lucky enough to hold on to the job might own it in next 20
years). As I have seen most of the pushy parents are highly incompetent who
actually believe that their life is over, they can’t change it because they
missed opportunities when they were young. A real person would go achieve what
he wants at any age irrespective of anything else but pushy parents are not
that because they are betting on their kids and that is much easier.

The other part of the problem is housewives (I am not sexist); this is a group
which actually doesn’t have an identity. If you have ever been near one, most
of their sentences start with “My son/daughter is…” most of these sentences
end with an achievement of their kids which are incidentally better than other
housewives kids. Now the housewives who were humiliated in the conversation go
home force their kids to do well in whatever they do. It is certainly not
limited to studies; it can be anything jumping a fence, throwing a ball or
anything else. At the end of the day, their kid has to be better than other
kids. It is kind of like playing a MMORPG where they want their avatar to be
better than others and they want their avatars to level up faster so that they
can fight bigger battles. So the problem is certainly not the education
system, it is actually the society (housewives and people who are not happy
with their jobs). So my solution would be think about the kids later, create
jobs for housewives (idle minds are devil's workshop, they are the clear
example of it). Keep the housewives busy and you would automatically see an
improvement in kids who are back to being creative and independent like they
always were.

Sorry for 600 words long rant, I am just pissed with how things are going on
here right now. It actually took me an hour to write this. :)

~~~
hardik
With all due respect, your views and analysis are only relevant to the urban
experience.

"anyone who is slightly not retarded" does NOT land up a job in non-metros.

Just visit a tier 2 city like Nashik (I am not even talking about proper rural
areas) and see the employment opportunities there. At such places success
stories abound of sons and daughters of lower middle class workers who cracked
some competitive exam or another have landed, and naturally students are
inspired to work harder.

Go little deeper and in the rural areas, the socio-economic conditions there
are such that kids who can attend schools and colleges consider themselves
privileged. And these people do uplift the economic situation of the entire
family.

The point I am trying to drive here is that the parents are generally right to
emphasize the importance of education to their children. Of course, obsessive
behavior as demonstrated in this article is wrong.

The inherent problem which leads to this is two fold: lack of seats and
unscientific content in education.

Lack of Seats There is an utter shortage of seats in all educational centers
in India. This leads to higher "cut off" grades leading to obsessive
competition. The very idea that grades are the blanket deciding factor to deem
a student fit to attend a certain school is very poor and it needs scrutiny
urgently.

Unscientific content The Indian education, in its current form, discourages
creativity, emphasizes solely on memorization capabilities (I have some
friends who are now managers at Big Four IT companies who memorized essays for
English exam and sums for Math exams and got super grades) and is highly
politicized. It is geared to train students to be doers and not thinkers, it
does not light the burning curiosity that I feel is very important to really
learn anything (be it math, sciences, even history, etc)

IMHO, there is an need to modernize the educational system which should solve
many a problems.

It is a mammoth task; grading system, content, creativity, the "tuition
problem" to name a few obstacles. We can start out by accepting the problems.

Again, all due respect to your views. I can relate with them and probably
would have completely supported them had I not had the opportunity to visit
what some call the "real India" :)

~~~
luckystrike
Well written. The 'real' India is indeed far bigger than 'non-retards' working
in IT industry.

And as was discussed in this forum a few days ago, teachers have the most
important role to play in imparting good education and encouraging creativity
and learning over marks. They can actually make a huge difference even with
this current system.

~~~
muon
In reality very few teachers inspire. In my 16 years of education hardly three
people inspired me. Do teachers here understand their roles and
responsibilities? Bad teachers want the students to opt for private tuitions,
which is again run by them.

------
quantumhobbit
It is sad but this mentality seems to have spread to the U.S. at least in the
form of Chinese grad students. It isn't very intellectually stimulating to
discuss chemistry with someone whose idea of being great in Organic Chemistry
is having memorized Org Chem textbooks in English before he could speak
English. What is worse is that professors admire the amount of work Chinese
students put in compared to their American counterparts. I feel a lot of
pressure to work mindlessly and without any creativity. I think that this
model of education is not sustainable and will damage American higher
education in the long run.

Sometimes I feel out of place in graduate school in an engineering department.
I'm the only person I know of here who reads Faulkner and listens to Coltrane
in his spare time. I get the feeling that if I told my adviser that I was
teaching myself French on the weekends, he would consider it a waste of time.
Not that reading Faulkner helps me learn Quantum Chemistry, but I feel like a
well rounded education will help me make breakthroughs later in Quantum
Chemistry. But I'm finding that dissatisfaction with the slavishly work hard
in one chosen area is the minority opinion and it is hard not to be
disheartened by this.

------
rms
[http://translate.google.com/translate?prev=hp&hl=en&...](http://translate.google.com/translate?prev=hp&hl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.chinaelections.org%2FNewsInfo.asp%3FNewsID%3D142748&sl=zh-
CN&tl=en)

Machine translation so you can see the comments... thoughts seem to range from
"it's your parents fault" and "your parents are right, you can rest after your
education" to "when you kill yourself take your teacher out with you."

------
sounddust
Can anyone translate, or at least summarize, the comments from the original
article in Chinese? I tried using Google, but none of them made any sense
except the first one (which was apparently written in bad Chinese by an
American)

------
fuzzmeister
Parents should push their children to succeed through positive reinforcement
and good example, not through fear.

~~~
puffythefish
Ugh. This is why I hate the grading system. The basic premise the entire
system relies on is _fear_ of failure, which, to me, seems to be completely
counter-productive to learning. When I am actually learning something, for
instance programming, I don't learn by marginally getting better and going to
a slightly higher level before, still succeeding at every step — I learn
immersing myself in something completely over my head that I don't understand,
and absolutely, miserably failing. When I finally get it, not only is the
experience extremely gratifying, but I actually _learn_ it; it's very
difficult to forget something you now understand that only moments ago looked
nearly impossible. In school, doing this is not only discouraged but nearly
impossible — fail a class for even a few weeks and it will be very difficult
to get your grade up and be able to get in any more honors classes;
essentially, through the grading system you're labeled satisfactory (A/B,
depending on your standards), average (C) or a failure (F), even though the
only way to learn is through your mistakes.

I think a good indicator of how well you're learning something is to ask
yourself, "If I asked myself about this subject 6 months ago, would I think I
was an idiot?". In school, I can think of maybe 3 subjects that's true in, but
not by much. With something I'm teaching myself through failing, like
programming, I would probably think I was an idiot less than _one_ month ago.

~~~
pg
I wasn't motivated by fear. It was more like trying to be high scorer on a
video game. Which is also somewhat of a stupid motivation, but probably not as
stupid.

I think the problem is not grades per se but the difference between what
they're supposed to measure and what they actually do. That difference can be
small (I can remember college classes where it was), but it takes an effort.

~~~
tungstenfurnace
Who needs grades anyway? Do employers need grades?

I think the purpose of grades is primarily for bureaucrats to compare schools.

Teachers are the ones being paid. Grade them, not the pupils. Children need to
know which classes are worth attending.

------
Rabidmonkey1
This article is by a kid who is still in this situation. I can't speak or
write Chinese, but if someone can reach him via the comments on the original
article, please tell him to leave there and explore the world. It's much
bigger than the silly schools he's in and there are plenty of opportunities
for him to become successful.

~~~
poutine
You really have no clue. This poor kid probably doesn't have the money for a
train trip to Shanghai much less to explore the world. He has no ability to
work other places inside China and nobody would hire him where he'd make any
money where he is. He is trapped and a Chinese university degree is the only
way out.

~~~
Rabidmonkey1
Hey, that's just plain insulting! FYI I've been all over China - I spent 2
weeks there with a sports team in 2005 playing all over the country -
literally east from Beijing to as far wast as Urumchi, which nearly hits the
Russian border - in fact, Russians came down to watch the team play.

Have you ever been to China? I have. I know what it's like.

The kid obviously has internet access - isn't that something? There are so
many possibilities inherent in that alone for him there, heck, even for
something as simple as a solid friendship to keep him grounded. What gives you
the authority to declare his fate?

~~~
poutine
I've been living in China for years, have Chinese friends and employ Chinese
people.

------
Eliezer
This goes beyond madness into the realm of Sparta.

------
kragen
Education is a laudable value, but cruelty in service of a laudable value is
still cruelty and still reprehensible. Also, grades are not a great way to
measure learning.

I wish more of the rural poor in the US would tell their kids things like,
"You should also learn from your cousin, talk to him more--then you will
develop your mind." There are a minority who do, a large majority who don't
care. I wish the stress I remember from US high schools had been from wanting
to do better academically instead of fear of physical brutality from the other
students.

If this guy's family is typical, China is going to do really well academically
in the next few decades unless their government screws everything up again.
And it's going to have to deal with a lot of traumatized young graduates.

------
triplefox
I had something of an experience like this in the US system. My mom was overly
concerned about my grades because, in her view, the only way to get a good
education and "be successful" was to test into the top math+science classes,
as that was what my older brother did. (She wasn't able to admit that until
last year after I finished college and got a job. My brother is finishing his
PhD and now realizes that he doesn't want to research math the rest of his
life, he just liked studying it.)

Fortunately, the pressure was far less in my instance, and I ultimately found
a satisfactory compromise in college between my own goals and "successful"
goals, but the bitter feelings are the same. Learning isn't helped by making
it a threatening experience.

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radu_floricica
One of the proudest moments of my high-school life was when I decided _not_ to
study for a test... with a teacher I liked and respected. I still remember his
disappointed look at my grade. But it was something necessary, something to
drive home the point that grades are not important.

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jacktang
No matter the education or the business, I think what the Chinese should pick
up again is conscience.

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anthony_barker
Funny thing is that you can then turn around and hire this top grad for 7000
rmb a month after college. Top grades are not a guarantee for high paying
jobs. 7 million university grads per year.

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iamelgringo
_What can I do now?_

Learn how to program, drop out of school and start your own startup. At least
that's what the kids do here in America.

~~~
whacked_new
That's almost like saying, when a fish is suffocating because his pond has
become deprived of oxygen, "stop eating plankton and start eating rodents;
that's the way we lions roll here in the jungle."

In all seriousness, I can guarantee that this is far from an isolated case. If
he is 10th or 12th in his class, just how many are there, between him and the
1st, who basically live with the same thing, but either don't write about it,
or worse, write about it, but never get heard?

