Dai Jiagan, director of the Test Center of the Ministry of Education, proposed that the Academic Proficiency Test and evaluation of overall quality be introduced into the national matriculation test system in the future to avoid the situation in which one's fate is decided by merely one test.

Theoretically, the changes fit the requirement of quality education and can help to remove long existing unfairness. But they could also lead to malpractice and unhealthy results in China.

Since the Academic Proficiency Test could be permitted to take place under the administration of senior high schools themselves, no one can ensure that schools would not cheat on tests. Evaluation forms could be filled in by teachers themselves, without taking into account certain standards for evaluating a student’s performance in terms of moral, intellectual, physical, and aesthetic criteria. It’s hard to say the teachers’ words will be fair and square.

The changes bring colleges and universities a certain degree of independence in student recruitment. Theoretically this is not bad, but China is a society oriented toward relationships, obligations and interests, which can easily lead to malpractice and corruption.

Everyone knows the current national matriculation test’s defects and how to improve the system, but why hasn’t it been changed in 30 years? Because the Chinese fear that changes might cause power abuse and worse unfairness and injustice, although the changes are aimed at achieving fairness and justice.

The current matriculation test is not perfect, but it is still the fairest in China. Balancing the recruitment proportions of different provinces and municipalities, prevent cheating on the test and ensuring fairness in grading are more important for now.

Modern Express

Illustration: Liu Rui