Explained: Why China's Gaokao Is Considered The World's Toughest Exam
What is Gaokao and How Did It Get So Hard?
Gaokao, a Chinese word meaning "high test," refers to the National Higher Education Entrance Examination. It is typically conducted every June and lasts about 10 hours over multiple days.
The Gaokao examination tests three main subjects- Mathematics, Chinese Language and a Foreign Language and three other subjects specific to the students' education and career goals. The other subjects are chosen from Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Politics, History and Geography.
As per the South China Morning Post, some questions that have appeared in the recent Mathematics examinations were considered beyond high school level.
In mainland China, Gaokao is the only exam that determines whether a student can get into a university or not.
College entrance exams around the world are divided into two main categories - assessment and selective examinations. Assessment examinations such as the Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT) examination is US reflect the overall academic knowledge of the students, while selective examinations like China's Gaokao and "suneung" in South Korea help select students directly for top universities.
More than 10 million candidates have appeared for the GAOKAO examinations since 2019 and in 2024, of the 13.4 million candidates who took the test, only 40 per cent could score enough to get admission in university.
There are 2,820 higher education institutions in China and of them, only 115 have been included in Project 211, a program that determines the Institute's excellence in education. Getting admission into these universities is expected to help students secure a bright future ahead.
The national average acceptance rate at Project 211 schools is only 5 per cent, meaning that in 2024, each of the top 115 universities admitted, on average, just 5,800 students out of 13.4 million applicants.
On an average, Chinese students spent 60 hours per week studying and some even stop going to Middle school to solely focus on their Gaokao exam with the help of private tutor.
The pressure of Gaokao begins early, often in middle school, and is known to cause severe stress, anxiety, and depression. More than half of the students who committed suicide in Shenzen, China did so while under extreme pressure, as per the report published by Shenzen's bureau of education.
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