How long will the days of “water masters” and “water doctors” who can obtain certificates in as fast as three months last?
2024-08-26
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"Get a double master's degree from abroad in as fast as three months", "Get a single master's degree from the United States in half a month", "From technical secondary school to doctorate in just five years"... According to a recent report by Xinhua Daily Telegraph, some academic advancement institutions have posted advertisements for overseas "quick academic qualifications" online, and some have directly posted the overseas academic degree certificates of multiple students. A consultant from an academic advancement institution said that some people are willing to spend hundreds of thousands or even millions of yuan to buy an overseas academic qualification.
In fact, some overseas universities have been "crash-training" for a long time. Some local private universities overseas are not well-known, the quality of education is average, and there is no foreign language score requirement for applicants. Many schools adopt online teaching, and some do not even require graduation thesis. Some study abroad agencies take advantage of the characteristics of these schools, such as "easy admission, easy graduation", "short school system" and "low price", to open up a new track for studying abroad that seems to be "very cost-effective", from helping to "operate" applications, writing student homework and papers, to improving students' background when they return to China to find a job, providing a complete "one-stop" service. Such a crash-trained degree with low gold content is also nicknamed "water master" and "water doctor" by netizens.
Such a "quick-learning model" is quite popular. Many companies set academic qualifications when recruiting. Higher education also gives employees more advantages in terms of salary increase, promotion, professional title evaluation, settlement points, etc. Some companies even use academic qualifications as one of the reference indicators when laying off employees. All these factors will naturally stimulate some people's demand for higher education. Previously, the media revealed that some universities sent their own teachers abroad to study for a doctorate quickly, and then introduced them in batches to quickly complete the doctoral rate indicator in order to "upgrade and rename".
This kind of "quick success" to get a degree is extremely unfair to those students who have worked hard in school. After graduating and returning to China, the "quick success" PhDs enjoy the same talent policies and welfare benefits as those of normally trained PhDs. If those who "take shortcuts" to get a degree become the beneficiaries, and even rob those hard-working and practical people of their life opportunities, it will disrupt the educational order, undermine educational fairness, and damage the credibility of official certification agencies.
At the same time, if you spend money to buy a "quick degree" overseas, what you get may not be a pie in the sky but a trap. Searching the keyword "degree" on the online complaint platform "Black Cat Complaint" yields more than 40,000 complaint records, most of which involve "false advertising" and "refusal to refund" and other issues. Therefore, individuals should remain rational and avoid being fooled by the "shortcuts" in front of them, otherwise not only will the time and economic costs be wasted, but it may also have a negative impact on their career development.
To curb the chaos of "quick academic qualifications", we should strengthen the examination of academic qualification certification, improve the information disclosure of certified institutions, and further strengthen the supervision of intermediary agencies. At present, my country's recognition of foreign degrees is mainly based on mutual recognition agreements signed with other countries. Such mutual recognition can distinguish authenticity, but cannot control quality, and it is difficult for employers to effectively screen when recruiting. Therefore, professional institutions can be encouraged to conduct assessments, publish assessment reports, and strengthen social supervision.
The phenomenon of "some countries awarding fast-track master's and doctoral degrees to Chinese students" has received attention at the legislative level. The "Degree Law of the People's Republic of China", which will be implemented in January 2025, clearly requires that "the recognition of degree certificates issued by overseas educational institutions should be handled strictly in accordance with relevant national regulations." Since September 2021, the Education Ministry's Overseas Study Service Center has successively issued five batches of review announcements involving 32 foreign universities or their academic education programs. It is not difficult to foresee that the living space of "water masters" and "water doctors" in China will become increasingly narrow in the future.
The chaos of "quick-learning education" is also a reminder that we must establish a correct talent concept in the whole society, break the rigid evaluation tendency of only focusing on academic qualifications, papers, and qualifications, and establish a sound and scientific and pragmatic talent evaluation and assessment mechanism. Only in this way can we eliminate the soil for the survival of "quick-learning education".
Author: Lu Yue
