Ethnic Han protests exam policy favoring minorities

Parents of Han ethnic students in Southwest China’s Guizhou Province staged a rally to protest against preferential policies toward ethnic minority students on China’s college entrance exams, or gaokao, prompting local education authorities to reconsider the policy.

Photos of the gathering have gone viral since July 21 when hundreds of parents held up signs reading, “Remove unreasonable extra points,” “Adjust preferential policies toward ethnic minority students,” and “Equitable exam” reportedly inside a Guizhou provincial office.

Departments and offices involved in the policymaking process are discussing a policy adjustment, a Guizhou provincial office staffer of the office of letters and calls told the Global Times on Monday.

She refused to provide her full name or any details on the issue.

The policy states that students of ethnic minorities, including Yi and Hui in Guizhou, are entitled to 10 to 20 extra points to their total gaokao score depending on their household registration information.

In Liupanshui, one of the nine cities and prefectures in Guizhou, 9,735 minority ethnic students received extra points on the 2018 gaokao in June, the Liupanshui government website said.

Xi Wuyi, an expert on Marxism at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, also a Sina Weibo blogger with more than 390,000 followers, posted on July 21 a letter sent to her from a Guizhou Han ethnic student’s mother, in which she expressed her concerns about the “unfair” policy.

The preferential policy “should benefit students in poor areas who truly need help, but the current high ratio of ethnic minority students receiving extra points has caused inequality in the exam,” a netizen claiming to be a parent of a Han ethnic student in Guizhou wrote in an online message to Guizhou government officials.

Messages with similar petitions are available on the website, where citizens can petition the local government officials.

None of the messages have received replies.

Some netizens consider the policy discriminatory against the Han ethnic group.

Xi said amending the policy in favor of minority ethnic students in Guizhou “will cultivate a sense of national community in the country.”