Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Entry Eleven: The Students



Our county, also called Jinhua, has a set of high schools to serve the very large population. The schools are ranked using a system based on the test scores of graduates. Because admission to the school is also based on test scores, the ranking is pretty stable. I teach at the number two middle school in Jinhua. They call it a middle school, but the students are of our high school age.

There are two ways to gain admittance to this competitive school. The first method, as previously stated, is to score very well on exams. The other method, which is less common, is to pay a heft tuition bill. Basically, the wealthy students pay to subsidize the education of the high test score students. There are a few athletes on scholarship as well, and I also think there is a special relationship for children of faculty at the attached University.

So, as you can see, the public high school system is run more like a set of private schools. And, in a sense, the admission process for high school in China is similar to the college admissions process in America (although the emphasis is solely on exam scores). Because of this system, students come from all over Zhejiang Province to attend the number two school. Many live much too far away to be bused in every day, which is fine, because the school is residential.

The campus looks more like a university than a high school. There are two fenced in dormitories, one for boys and one for girls. There is a massive four story cafeteria, as well as a convenience store. At this store I have bought everything from a bottle of water to fruit to stationary to ping pong supplies (I am improving). The athletic complex is impressive, and includes many basketball courts, volleyball courts, tennis courts, ping pong rooms, and a track and field. At the center of campus is a square or quad with administrative buildings to one side, and the classroom buildings on the other. The landscaping has flowers, as well as a pathway around a man made pond. It is a beautiful place to teach, and I suppose to live as well. The student body, well over three thousand students, lives at school six days a week. Many only go home only once a month. All of the schools I am familiar with in China are residential.


Primary school students appear to attend school in the same city where they live, and go home at supper time. I work with a group of primary school students on Sunday nights. They speak very little English, but are in the process of learning it and improving. There are whispers among the faculty that there are proposals to require even more English education to create a bilingual society. I love working with the little kids, and perhaps will dedicate a future blog to them. At this point however, I am most familiar with high school.

The high schoolers' day seems grueling, from before 7am until about 10pm. But, the students have lengthy breaks in the day to let off steam and work on homework. The lunch break is more than two hours long, and many students will take thirty minutes of that time to play basketball or tap a nap. After dinner there are classes until 7pm, followed by monitored study sessions until the end of the day. This is a time for students work on their homework, which they have a lot of here.

The stakes are very high in Chinese education. The competition in the job market is fierce, and because of the one child policy there is a lot riding on the success of ‘only-child’ students. Examinations, a long tradition in Chinese education, still plays the central role in determining where a student attends college and what they do after. With all of this pressure it easy to understand why my students enter my class acting a little less serious. There is no exam connected to my class, and frankly, they need the break.

Some of my students are now participating in a pen pal program with a few students at OHCHS. If you have interest in joining such a program, please email my school address: jlong@sad17.k12.me.us

Below I have included anonymous excerpts from some of these letters for your consideration. The excerpts are unedited; however I omitted sections that could be used to identify the student, and also the repetitive introductory paragraphs. I hope you get a sense for how sincere these students are, and maybe a taste of their many different personalities as well.

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“You like field hockey and lacrosse. Mr. Long has described those to me, but I don’t how it look like either because in China we cant see the,. I like shopping too, that’s cool! But sometime I only do window-shopping, and that’s also attract me. When I am shopping I can forget everything. Do you think I am crazy?

My father is a college teacher, he teaches biology. His school is beautiful, and I’m going to study there one year later.”

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“In China, all the student are very tired everday. In our school, we get up at 6 o’clock in the morning. Then we do some exercises. We have 5 classes in the morning until 12 o’clock. In the afternoon we have 3 classes. In the evening, we can’t go home because all the students live in the school. There are so much homework, we always do them in the evening. At 10:10 pm we can go to bed.

Except the hard life, there are many rules in our school. We can’t talk mobile phone, mp3, mp4. We can’t make boyfriends or girlfriends. In class, we must keep quiet. In our class there are 47 students. Luckily, they are all friendly and lovely. So it makes our life not very terrible.”

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“You ask me write about some delicious food so you can make it. Oh I think its hard work because Chinese food always very complex. I can teach you an easy one. Does there have cucumber? You can buy them from the supermarket. Then cut them into pieces. Put them in a small dish, then put vinegar, soy, salt, and mix them even. After some minutes, you can eat it.”

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“I study in No. 2 middle school of my city. We have a lot of homework everyday. That is boring, I think. I go back home once a week, but sometimes two weeks. I think its happy to stay in school at weekends, we can do what we want to do but we cant during the weekdays.

I have one elder sister, she is beautiful. She studies design. We lived in a village with a big river. And there’s a big tree, about 25 meters or higher. I can cook Chinese food good, and I like playing basketball.”

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“This week our class has a basketball competition. I hope we will win. Our competitor is so strong. Girls will play volleyball in May.”

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“My home is very near to my school. What is funny is that I spend my primary school in Jinhua. I spend my middle school in Jinhua. Also I spend my high school in Jinhua. What is worse is that I will spend my university life in Jinhua. Do you think it’s a very gloomy thing?”

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“I like playing volleyball and badminton. I also like shopping and reading. Our school is very beautiful we think, we very like it. But we are very busy everyday. We have a lot of homework. We live in school. Every month we go home a time. We very envy your life.”

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“Last weekend I went home to celebrate the Tomb-Sweeping Day. It’s our traditional festival. On that day, my family went to the hills where our ancestor’s tombs were there, to memory them. Also we ate traditional food called “Qing Ming Guo”, sweet or salt but very delicious.”

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“I am a lucky dog because all of the people surrounding me are so friendly. I also play with them. I am happy all the time especially with weather is sunny. I like listening to the music like you. I think music is a magical thing. It can let me feel excited and forget the unhappy, tired, angry things.

My English vocabulary is limit. So I can’t express myself. I can’t describe Chinese culture. But don’t be sad. I will work hard to learn English to tell you more. Talk to you soon.”

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“My school is Jinhua No. 2 Middle School. It is a beautiful school. Most students in our class are living in school. I like to live with my classmates. We always play games, talk to each other and so on. I’m very happy to stay with my friends.”

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“Every day the teacher told us we must study hard or we can’t go to the better school. Every day is very busy for us. We have many homework to do, like Chinese, English, Math, history and so on. The reason of that is we have a large population in China.

My hobby is swimming, playing piano and playing “Gu zheng.” Gu zheng is a kind of Chinese musical instrument.”

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“I’m excited to have the opportunity to be writing to you. It’s been an interest of mine for years to talk to a teenager like myself that’s actually from America.”

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“The most important festival in China is the Spring Festival. It likes your Christmas holiday. People usually visit relatives during that time. Some of them go to shopping in supermarket to prepare the biggest supper the day before it.

On that day, most people will play with the fireworks to celebrate. When people hear the loud sound from fireworks, everyone smiles for looking forward to next harvest year coming.

In 2008, Beijing will hold the 29th Olympic Games. I wish it will be held successfully and give people all over the world a strong impression.

We will make friends at that time. It is really a good opportunity to communicate with people from all over the world. China will catch this chance to develop our economy. I have confidence to believe China will be more and more beautiful in the future.

America is a mystery place. When I was young I wish to go there for studying. Now I’m approaching my dream. I think it will come true for sometime. The most thing I like is American’s food. I like the taste of the food, like the potato chips and chickens.”

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“I have ever been to England and Australia, so I know some about your live, believe I can imagine. And we have been learned about American history, it is wonderful. In my spear time I often read books, play with my friends, and surf the internet. I can play basketball as a sport, but I am not very good at it. I love horses, too. I rode horses when I was in Australia. I enjoy that feeling.”

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“I stay at school. I come back home once a month. We can’t stay with our parents usually so we do everything by ourselves. It can make us self-made. I think you are more independent than us. Commonly Chinese parents are more doting to children than American parents. Maybe you are right.”

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“In school days, I live in school with 5 classmates. We are in a special class. We don’t need to have exam when we go to university. Because that the study for us isn’t very important like others. But its still very heavy. We have 8 classes a day and we often study more than 10 hours. Maybe you feel it is unbelievable but it is true.

Even that, we still have free time to doing other things. I like reading and I have read many books. Do you read Harry Potter? It is really beautiful magic world. Also, I like watch NBA basketball games. Do you like it? Which team and basketball star is your favorite?”

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“I have many friends who are kind and humor. Saturday is the most happy day to me. After class, I can go outside for shopping, eating all kinds of food with my friends. In evening, we can talk with each other and sing until late in the night because we are free, there are no teachers in charge of us. That’s mainly life in the school. What do you think of it?”

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Well, so what do you think of it? Please post comments.

Final note: I have been invited to judge another festival, this time live on TV. As far as I can tell, the only credential I carry to earn me this TV honor is that they "need a foreigner." I think that is a strange thing to "need," but as always, I don't mind.

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