Dave of Under the Tenement Palm has a critique of China’s education system which, among other things, he says is too dependent on multiple-choice testing:
The “multiple choice test” rules with an iron fist in China - and I’m speaking as an American who shares many of Chirol’s concerns. But while I took many machine-readable #2 pencil tests in NYC, more than I think necessary, multiple choice tests are taken to an extreme here in Western China that I would’ve thought unthinkable in NYC… As a teacher in China, I’d have to say that I prefer that “a Bachelors Degree in America is pursued merely for the sake of having one", which allows a certain amount of personal reponsibility … rather than a system in which my students have had not only their majors changed by the Education Ministry, but have been relocated thousands of miles from the university of their choice (always the one closest to home) to the farthest flung western province of China…
As well as the multiple-choice tests, there are also the single-choice exams.:
Oh, and then theres the mandatory political exams (this years topics “WW2 and the Taiwan problem…. mostly Taiwan” my students said - followed by “no one ever fails". Small wonder, there’s only one answer here)
