CHINA / National

Girl challenges 'gaokao' with zero
By Echo Shan (chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2006-07-05 17:09

A senior high school graduate submitted an unconventional paper for the college entrance exams, or gaokao, this year, challenging the current elitist selection system, reports the Beijing News.


A senior high school graduate submitted an unconventional paper for the college entrance exams, or gaokao, this year, challenging the current elitist selection system. [Henan Business Post]
 

Nineteen-year-old Jiang Duoduo, a female graduate from Nanyang No. 8 Middle School, in Central China's Henan Province, scored 114 points in the June trial gaokao, a far cry from what she had expected.

Jiang wanted to get zero on the gaokao to serve as a warning to officials about the state of the gaokao as she saw it.

To make sure she didn't get any points, Jiang wrote her answers in two colors, a severe breach of examination rules.

She also filled in the blank spaces on the paper with questions and writing venting her discontent towards the current education system and the gaokao format.

In the space on the exam paper where students are not allowed to write, she signed her pen name "Heart-Broken Flying Devil."

Envisioning "no grade divisions, friend-like teacher-student relations, quality education, and an innovation-oriented teaching method," Jiang vaguely outlined her ideal education system.

The girl harshly criticized the college entrance exams, citing students' waning creativity and innovation abilities.

In her second year in senior middle school, Jiang became bored with common school education and began to harbor a deep-rooted hatred of the college entrance exams that she had to soon face. .

Rigid doctrines and the expectations of gaokao totally ruined Jiang's interest in schooling.

She turned to writing as a release, which she has done since primary school.

"My writings were often picked as model essays and circulated in class in grade school," Jiang says.

Shrugging off the idea of a college education, Jiang foresees no possible fulfillment of her expectations of higher education. "Why bother to squeeze onto the narrow bridge?" she asks.

When asked about her future plans, Jiang says she is considering acting or writing.

"Anyway dream is just dream," she says. "I'd better be true to reality."

Jiang's parents were kept in the dark about her plans for the gaokao and scolded her when they found out what had happened. She says she feels slightly guilty because her parents wanted a higher education for her.