Strong Echo to Public Collection for College Entrance Exam Questions

China's Ministry of Education recently started its second public collection of questions for college entrance examination.

Sources from National Education Examination Authority of Ministry of Education indicate that all circles in society showed strong interests in the activity.

The website for question collection for the college entrance examination (http://www.neea.edu.cn/zhnl.htm) has become a hot website. According to incomplete statistics, the Examination Authority has received more than 1000 questions through e-mails, letters and other means, many of which were from high-school students.

As a main measure for reforming college entrance examination, Ministry of Education has since March 1999 started to collect questions for college entrance examinations, mainly purporting to test the comprehensive abilities of examinees. The first collection of questions concerned only the general courses of Chinese, mathematics and foreign languages. More courses such as physics, chemistry, geography, history and politics and biology as well are to be included this time. Specific requirements for questions to be collected are detailed in the website, defining that the questions are for checking the ability and quality of the students with more stresses to be laid on the practicality and applicability of the questions.

According to the analysis on the feedback of the first collection made by the Authority, most of the participants are teachers and students. Fifteen percent are high-school students and 60 percent high-school teachers. College and university teachers and retired teachers account for 10 percent respectively, and personages of other circles caring for the reform of college entrance examinations, also come to 10 percent.

With the collected questions filed in computers the Authority invited experts from different aspects to study the questions and sort out appropriate ones in accordance with the specific requirements for college entrance examinations. Excellent questions will be listed in Question Base and will possibly be used in the college entrance examinations this year.

However, person in charge of the National Examination Center told the journalist that the possibility for the collected questions stored in the Question Base to be used in the examination is very rare. Last time only saw seven percent of the collected questions listed in the Base, and those appeared in examination papers were even less. Nevertheless, participators are very enthusiastic about it, said the person in charge, but they can hardly grasp the requirements for the contents and difficulties of the questions to meet the specific demands of questions for the exams. Besides, some questions are more or less similar to the former used in the "sea of question strategy". Therefore, it's not an easy job to blaze a new trail.

Although few questions can be used in exams, it is, however, highly appreciated for people of all walks of life to make their participation in it and the promotional functions brought about in the reform. Besides, these questions also provide something enlightening to the reform. Some questions in last year's exam were created on the basis of the stimulant thoughts. The person in charge of the Authority added that it is a pleased phenomenon for high-school students to take an active part in the question collection, which has offered them rights and opportunities to participate in the reform of college entrance examination.



By PD Online Staff Du Minghua


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