news

한어Русский языкEnglishFrançaisIndonesianSanskrit日本語DeutschPortuguêsΕλληνικάespañolItalianoSuomalainenLatina

"Under the new college entrance examination, a large proportion of high school students choose science, resulting in a bias towards science and other subjects, and a serious shortage of teachers."

Recently, the Education and Sports Bureau of Anfu County, Ji'an City, Jiangxi Province, revealed in response to a proposal by a CPPCC member that there are currently few graduates in relevant majors trained by colleges and universities, and there is a great demand for teachers in scarce subjects in various schools. The county has not been able to complete its recruitment plans for each scarce subject in recent years.

In order to resolve the serious shortage of teachers in scarce subjects in high schools, Anfu County has increased the introduction of teachers in scarce subjects in high schools through three methods. First, it vigorously implements the talent introduction plan and opens a "green channel" for recruitment. Since 2021, 29 high school teachers have been recruited through the "green channel"; second, the provincial normal university's public-funded normal student enrollment plan has been increased to train teachers in scarce subjects. Since 2021, 52 public-funded normal students have been signed, which can gradually alleviate the serious shortage of teachers in some scarce subjects. Third, the provincial unified enrollment plan is biased towards scarce subjects. In 2024, the provincial unified enrollment plan plans to recruit 20 high school teachers, including 9 in scarce subjects.

The Anfu County Education and Sports Bureau introduced that in the next step, the bureau will continue to deepen the recruitment of high school teachers to inject new vitality into the development of high school education in Anfu County. First, the number of teachers will be re-verified. It is planned to ask the County Party Committee Organization Department to re-verify the number of high school teachers, and use the spare staffing to increase the recruitment of teachers in scarce subjects. Second, the number of "green channel" recruitments will be increased. According to the specific conditions of the two high schools, two "green channel" recruitments will be launched in the first half and the second half of the year respectively. Third, the recruitment conditions for scarce subjects will be appropriately lowered. At present, most subjects require teacher-related majors, but there are relatively few teacher students in physics-related majors throughout Jiangxi Province, so the recruitment conditions for scarce subjects can be appropriately relaxed. Fourth, actively connect with colleges and universities, and propose to them suggestions for conducting research on scarce subjects, expand the enrollment scale of scarce subjects, and provide students who intend to teach with opportunities for teacher qualification training.

It is worth mentioning that on June 26, the Guangdong Provincial Education Examination Authority announced the score data of each subject and score range for the 2024 National College Entrance Examination. According to the score range statistics, there were 269,024 candidates who chose history, and 96,266 candidates who passed the exam, a decrease of 738 from last year. There were 450,961 candidates who chose physics, and 253,795 candidates who passed the exam, an increase of 17,709 from last year.

The Yangcheng Evening News reported that the number of physics candidates is nearly twice that of history candidates, and the number of candidates who have passed the entrance exam has exceeded twice that.

In the report, Li Binhui, a professor at the School of Literature and Media of Lingnan Normal University and an expert in national undergraduate education and teaching evaluation, believes that from the perspective of educational development, after the popularization of higher education, liberal arts majors that originally carried the connotation of "elite education", especially literature, art, philosophy and other disciplines, can no longer meet the needs of the masses, and higher education will inevitably develop towards application-oriented, technical and professional. The shrinkage of liberal arts majors and the reduction of liberal arts students are not the "patent" of my country's higher education, but have become a trend in higher education around the world.

Li Binhui analyzed that the number of candidates for the physics category of the college entrance examination has increased significantly. In addition to the result of the popularization of higher education, there are also the following reasons: First, it is the guidance of the country on the type and structure of talent demand. Due to the phenomenon that high-tech core technologies are "stuck in the neck" by others, the country has attached unprecedented importance to the cultivation of science and technology and scientific and technological talents, which will naturally affect the candidates' selection of subjects and application for the exam. Secondly, liberal arts has weak utilitarianism and the delayed and implicit nature of school-running effects. It is difficult to build a high level. Many universities find it difficult to guarantee the quantity and quality of liberal arts in the allocation of disciplinary resources and policy inclinations. There are relatively few liberal arts majors, and it is not ruled out that there are certain problems in the cultivation of liberal arts talents. In addition, with the continuous changes in the subject selection system, different universities have put forward different requirements for the subject selection combination when enrolling students. Many candidates and parents will choose physics, which has the widest enrollment range and the largest number of people, as their first choice. In the face of the labor market's demand for human resources, the nature of the subject determines that the selectivity of science in employment is relatively stronger than that of liberal arts.

In December 2023, Zhejiang media "Metro Express" reported that "the proportion of students in key high schools who choose physics and chemistry exceeds 60%" which also attracted attention.

Since Zhejiang implemented the new college entrance examination in 2014, high school students are no longer divided into arts and sciences. In addition to the three subjects of Chinese, mathematics and English, students no longer only study the combination of physics, chemistry and biology or the combination of politics, history and geography. Instead, they can choose three of the seven subjects of physics, chemistry, biology, politics, history, geography and information technology as their elective subjects. When recruiting students, colleges and universities can determine the elective subject requirements for each major based on the needs of their own school's talent training. Candidates can apply for the corresponding major only if their elective subject requirements meet the elective subject requirements of various majors in colleges and universities.

At the end of 2021, the Zhejiang Provincial Education Examination Institute announced the requirements for elective subjects for the 2024 enrollment of ordinary colleges and universities, and issued a statement-according to the regulations of the Ministry of Education, the elective subject requirements announced this time will be applicable from the 2024 college entrance examination enrollment. If there are no major adjustments and changes, the annual compilation will no longer be organized. The new elective subjects are based on the Ministry of Education's "Guidelines for the Requirements for Elective Subjects for Undergraduate Enrollment in Ordinary Colleges and Universities (General Edition)". Among the 92 professional categories listed in the "Guidelines", 65 professional categories require compulsory physics, 56 professional categories require compulsory chemistry, and 55 professional categories have the requirement of compulsory physics + chemistry. In other words, more than half of the undergraduate majors in college enrollment require candidates to take "physics + chemistry". Most science, engineering, agriculture, and medicine require students to take the elective subjects "physics + chemistry". Among the elective subjects, the combination of "physics + chemistry" is very important, which is a clear signal for high school students to choose courses in the future.

According to the report, a principal of a top high school in Hangzhou said that key universities generally require students to take physics and chemistry, which means that if you want to go to a good university, you must take physics and chemistry. However, he also reminded that "physics and chemistry are relatively difficult to learn, and they are for top students. The competition is very fierce. In the context of scoring, students with average grades taking physics and chemistry is equivalent to giving a scapegoat to their opponents. Students and parents should consider this carefully."

Regarding the adjustment and changes in the requirements for the college entrance examination, a member of the CPPCC Dezhou, Shandong Province, once analyzed in a proposal that the Shandong Provincial Education Admissions Examination Institute issued the "Explanation on the Announcement of the Requirements for the Elective Subjects of the 2024 General College Enrollment Majors (Professional Categories)" on December 31, 2021. The specific points are as follows:

1. The 2024 subject selection requirements have cancelled all "or" relationships and changed them to "and" relationships.

2. The required proportions for physics and chemistry subjects increased by more than 25 times.

3. The pure science combination of physics + chemistry + biology or the combination of physics + chemistry + geography/politics will become the mainstream popular.

4. Many courses that originally had high requirements for chemistry and biology, such as medicine and biology, no longer have biology requirements and have basically changed them to required subjects of physics and chemistry.

5. All levels of colleges and universities have strengthened the compulsory selection of physics and chemistry in science, engineering, agriculture, and medicine, while most of the literature, history, language, economics, and management majors no longer require the subject. According to statistics, among the 65 categories of universities, 70.65% require physics as a compulsory course, 60.87% require chemistry as a compulsory course, and 59.78% require physics and chemistry as a compulsory course. In the four disciplines of science, engineering, agriculture, and medicine, 55 of the 61 disciplines require physics and chemistry as a compulsory course, accounting for 90.16%.

6. When admitting students to university majors, 51.79% of the majors include physics subjects, 46.46% include chemistry subjects, 1.74% include history subjects, and 45.98% include "physics + chemistry" subjects.

The CPPCC member said that this shows that universities attach more and more importance to science, especially physics and chemistry, and "command" high school students to attach great importance to the teaching and research of physics and chemistry through the requirements for college entrance examination admission majors. Since Shandong Province began to implement the "3+3" new college entrance examination model in 2020, students who choose physics and chemistry have obvious advantages in high school admission, with a large range of majors to choose from, and more options for future employment.