Cash for college: Chinese school offers hefty cash prize, sparks debate

A middle school in Yantai, Shandong province, has rewarded one of its students with 500,000 yuan ($68,800) in cash for being admitted to the country's elite Tsinghua University.

Yantai Qinghua Middle School held an award ceremony on Saturday to present the award to Luan Tianhao, Shandong-based Qilu Evening News reported. Luan was admitted after scoring 681 points out of 750 in the national college entrance examination, or gaokao, and excelling in an additional test of Tsinghua University's "strengthening basic disciplines program", which placed him higher among Tsinghua's candidates.

Photos showed Luan being presented with bundles of cash. According to the school, the prize is a special scholarship established last year, awarding each student admitted to Tsinghua or Peking University 500,000 yuan. If more than 10 students are admitted, the total prize of 5 million yuan is divided among them. The report noted that three students have been awarded this scholarship over the past two years.

In his acceptance speech, Luan thanked the school, highlighting the high-quality resources, particularly in the physics labs, which he said greatly aided him in the "strengthening basic disciplines program" test.

Public records indicate that the private school was funded by Aiwei Group, a company specializing in household and commercial gas stations and pipelines. The scholarship is also named after the company.

While some praised the substantial award for significantly aiding students' lives in college, others criticized it as a commercial tactic to attract more students, potentially violating the Ministry of Education's guidelines against promoting high-scoring students.

In a commentary piece, the Beijing News argued that public schools could not afford such budgets, and allowing private schools to publicize high-scoring students could lead to a utilitarian approach to education, undermining its proper values.

Last month, a private high school in Yueqing, Zhejiang province, advertised a 500,000 yuan award for students admitted to Peking or Tsinghua University. The city's education bureau later canceled the initiative, stating it "violated recruitment rules by illegally setting up prizes," ThePaper.cn reported.