Is The Chinese Gaokao Exam Fair? By Gus Miller, Class 802

The Chinese gaokao is a massive examination that singlehandedly determines the taker’s fate for the rest of their lives by determining which colleges they go to, if any.

This test is the sole factor for college admission in China. The gaokao places vast amounts of stress on students and teachers alike. When this fact is combined with the grossly high stakes, we can clearly see that the entire system is wholly unjust.

The ways in which just one test could affect someone’s life are just part of the reason the gaokao is unfair. Whether or not someone goes to college will decide if they will be able to get a good, interesting, high-paying job, or be forced to live out their lives as farmers or construction workers, barely scraping out a living. It’s utterly unreasonable to decide so much based on just one test. We can also see how it adversely affects people. Teenagers in gaokao cram schools have been known to use intravenous drips to give themselves the stamina to study for over 15 hours a day. This clearly shows that too much is being put into a single test.

Another unjust part about the gaokao is the stress it places on people. In gaokao cram schools, almost everything about a teacher’s job- their wage, job security, and more- rests on the performance of their students. This drives them to extreme measures in order to get their students high scores. They frequently dole out punishments, and security guards patrol the perimeters. There are also security cameras that constantly track students. As for the students themselves, suicide rates skyrocket in teens preparing for the gaokao. Many families put everything on the line for this exam. Poorer parents divert almost all of their income to prep school wages in hopes that their kids can get good jobs. Many more well-off people will opt to place their children in private schools or in schools in other countries to avoid the hardships of the gaokao.

Finally, the gaokao is simply an inept judgement of student’s skills. There’s no way any reason or sense can be found in the idea of one test dictating the future of millions of students. It can’t be assumed that one exam is an accurate indicator of a student’s knowledge, and yet this exam could mean so much for entire families. It’s utterly unjust for this ineffective system to send some students to high up, prestigious colleges, which is basically a golden ticket to a good future, and condemn others to manual labor and most likely poverty, without any definite knowledge of the student’s academic level.

In conclusion, the gaokao exam is an unfair system that needlessly jeopardizes the futures of millions of families. It places enormous and needless amounts of pressure on students and teachers alike. The level of stress is harmful and unhealthy, and in the end, the whole exam is just hugely inefficient and unjust. Although many people are calling for reforms, the Chinese government has been slow to change this problem.