About Socialising

Obviously nothing is good for everybody. But there is a reason why the education in places like China is miles ahead of the US. This is one of the reasons. I don't particularly agree with the concept of public humiliation, but at the same time if I had to choose between that and a soft American education, I'd choose the former.

I work at my high school, I deal with education every day nd the HS I work at is one of the highest rated public schools in California. It's shocking to me how little a lot of the kids know, many of the 10th and 11th graders I work with can't write a coherent essay. Almost everyone is failing geometry and algebra 2. A big part of the reason for our failure to educate is because we don't promote a rigorous enough curriculum and students aren't pushed hard enough.

Again, this isn't the case for everyone. If I was publicly humiliated, I might shut down and stop caring, but then again it might motivate me even more, who knows. Just because many Chinese students aren't 'free thinking' in the way that American students are doesn't mean it's bad. There is no universal law that says our Western notions of freedom of thought and expression are fundamentally better than other modes of thought. All the Chinese people I know (and I know a lot, my best friend is Chinese, my ex gf was Chinese, I went to UCSD which has 99% asians...) have the capacity for deep contemplation of different things, etc. They're not really robotic, except in stuff that pertains to China (like their views on Tibet, from my experience). There really is not much that separates my Chinese friends from my other friends except that all my Chinese friends are much more disciplined, have a much better work ethic, and have a much more solid foundation of education.

You should really try living in China for awhile, especially on a university campus if you can, and spend a lot of time communicating with the students. You'll quickly realize many of the strengths and flaws in both your own and their education systems. Chinese education is extremely rigorous, but by no means is it better, and most intelligent Chinese will be quick to point out the flaws in their own education system.

For example, as has been pointed out, many Chinese are not particularly adept at creative thinking. There are a lot of reasons for this. Did you know that in China, papers (such as reports, essays, any of that sort of thing) are often not taken seriously at all, to the point where most students download papers from the internet or literally turn in the exact same papers as their classmates? What's more, this is perfectly acceptable and common even from the hardest working students. The 10th and 11th graders you spoke of may not be able to write coherent essays, but many Chinese are certainly not able to do any better.

Not only that, but you would be quite surprised at the other forms of cheating that go on in China. It's not uncommon at all for someone to walk into an exam and take it for their friend (especially in English exams), or for people to just blatantly cheat by talking or looking at materials during the exam. You can even often buy the answers ahead of time to many exams, such as the CET-4 or CET-6, as well as others. The list goes on and on. While the 高考,or the infamous high school exam that students take to get into a university, is particularly difficult and taken very seriously, afterwards things change a bit. Many students will study very hard and take them seriously still, but cheating still happens quite a lot.

You'll also quickly find that many students tend to specialize in particular areas (such as some kind of math or science), and be quite ignorant in multiple other areas. In fact, Chinese are particularly poor in their knowledge of the rest of the world. Americans may have the stereotype for being the most ignorant about the rest of the world, but anyone who's lived abroad in certain countries can tell you that is very far from being the truth. You would be amazed at the stereotypes you can hear about many different countries when speaking with the average Chinese, and usually what they say is exactly the same (literally word-for-word), even when communicating with people from very different parts of the country. When you engage in any sort of further discussions with most people regarding their respective countries, most people will meet you with confused faces. While that's not a problem unique to the Chinese, they are quite fond of their stereotypes, often more so than those in the West. That being said however, they are very eager to learn more.

Chinese are no doubt extremely hard-working in most aspects of their life at school. Many of them go to the classroom to study in silence for hours at a time, every day. As has been discussed, most Chinese are pushed very hard to do well on standardized tests. The problem is that scoring well on standardized tests says very little about how intelligent or how well-educated you are. Many Chinese are able to score well on tests, but often without really even understanding the material. They have become quite good at learning how to do well on tests without actually knowing the material well, and there are many organizations in China designed to improve test scores that further this problem. It is definitely true that many of them do severely lack critical thinking skills, and it's a problem that is not being addressed.

You're basing much of what you're saying off of Chinese that have ventured outside of China. Chinese that leave China, even for a short time, are forever changed, and cannot be accurately compared to those who have not. Opening up your mind is something that is difficult to reverse, and it does have a very large effect on overseas Chinese.

There are a lot of stereotypes that people in the West believe about China and Asia in general, and their education is one of those things. There are many things about Chinese education that you just won't know or even understand until you experience it first-hand. Most overseas Chinese have no idea either, despite how much they may claim to know, unless they actually went to high school or university in China. There are DEFINITELY strengths in the Chinese education system, and there are most DEFINITELY some very obvious flaws as well. It's quite an interesting thing, and experiencing it will really open up your eyes and make you realize that Western education, and specifically American education, while flawed as well, is nowhere near as bad as what many would have you believe.