SAVED BY THE BELL

To relieve academic pressure under the Covid-19 pandemic, the Shenzhen Education Bureau has cancelled all elementary and secondary school final examinations, save for entrance and provincial academic proficiency examinations, and will not publish students’ test scores.

The cancellation follows a string of student suicides attributed to study pressure: Shanghai’s Pudong district has reported 14 cases so far in 2020, exceeding the annual numbers of the past three years. In May, the state-run Health Times reported that 18 students had jumped off buildings in the past three months, and called for increased attention on students’ mental health.

The decision faced backlash from some parents, who commented online that it coddles children and “fails to hold teachers accountable.” A teacher surnamed Li reasoned on Baidu Baijiahao, “I understand that under the college entrance examination system, it is unrealistic to avoid scores, but the physical and mental harm to our children cannot be ignored.”