From Tianya, October 14th 2008:

Yesterday, someone reported that a pupil at the Binhe Road Primary School in Dengfeng City [in Henan province] has been standing outside the classroom to listen to lessons for over 20 days, suspecting that the teacher was punishing the student.

Yesterday afternoon at 2pm, a reporter rushed to Binhe Road Primary School. After hearing the class bell ring, the students entered the classroom one by one. However, under the classroom window for Class 1-3, a little girl carrying a backpack said goodbye to the schoolmates who talk to her. She grabbed the steel bar of the window with both hands and looked into the classroom uninterrupted. After reporter’s inquiry, the little girl is called Guo Xiaoxiao (name changed), from Wangzhuang Village nearby/of Dengfeng City, and 6-years-old this year. She used to attend class in this room but, for reasons unknown, she was kicked out of class. Not wanting to leave the school and still wanting to study, she could only stand under the window to listen to the lessons.

When Xiaoxiao’s father Guo Zhanchao arrived shortly later, seeing his daughter standing outside the window listening to class, he was unable to hold back his sobs. He told the reporter that he pedals three-wheel carts (carrying goods) for a living. Originally, he knew the Binhe Road School Headmaster Zhao. At the start of the school year, unable to find a school that would admit his child, he borrowed and gathered 500 RMB and gave it to Headmaster Zhao. Mr Zhao immediately agreed to admit Guo Xiaoxiao to the school, but later Mr Zhao delayed and delayed until the afternoon of September 10th when Mr Guo’s daughter was finally assigned to Class 1-3. But good things do not last; on September 18th, the daughter who had been attending school for only a few days said to her father while crying that the teacher would no longer let her into class, and that she could only stand outside the window to listen to lessons. Soon after, Guo Zhanchao went almost daily to the school to see the headmaster, but Headmaster Zhao only agreed to return the money and did not plan on arranging Guo Xiaoxiao to attend school.

Guo Zhanchao said with tears, “I suffered my whole life because I don’t have an education, and today can only depend on pedaling a three-wheel cart to raise my family with difficulty. I just want my daughter to learn some knowledge, so she can have a happy life later.”

Mr Zhao, headmaster of Binhe Road Primary School, commented on the incident saying that he is unfairly blamed. He said Guo Zhanchao and him knew each other from before, that he did indeed receive the 500 RMB money that Guo forcefully left in his office, but he later returned the money to Guo. Regarding letting Guo Xiaoxiao’s attend school, he can only feel sorry for their family’s situation, but could not arrange for her to attend school simply because they gave him a gift. Later, he could not do anything against the exclusion of Xiaoxiao. “That was handled in accordance to the relevant regulations of the Department of Education. She is the child of a peasant who migrated to the city for work, not a pupil of this area.”

Comments on Sina:

Everyone has their own duty. The duty of a farmer is to cultivate the fields, his daughter should research how to cultivate fields. Studying is for us city dwellers, hehe.

I cried…I can’t handle seeing little children, especially little girls, suffering the most… Seeing the girl stand by the window looking inside. it was unbearable.

Do you believe that I dare smash this kind of school?!

If you let one of her in today, tomorrow there might be 10 who come. City dwellers basically now all only have one child, but rural people all have 3 or 5. One husband and wife pair from the city occupies one seat in a classroom, but a rural husband and wife pair would occupy 3-5 seats in a classroom. I ask you, do you think this is fair and rational?

Old Mao utilised the farmers’ power to conquer everything under the sky [in this context: China]. He owes the farmers the most, because he separated people into different classes. This policy continues to this day without reform. [referring to the hukou system]

Do not carelessly be sympathetic. She should go to school in the place she is supposed to go to. School is not a homeless shelter.

Peasants, peasants. Pity the lowest class of people!

The child is worth our sympathy. But how come the countryside’s other children are not standing outside the windows to listen to class, is all because of their parents.

Do you have a method of contact? I will pay to let the child go to school!

TMD, what kind of society is this!!!!

Whether or not she can go to school is not the key, the key is why kick the little girl out after letting her go to school for a period of time? and then kick her out? There is some story inside here, was it because they gave too little money!!! Is anyone thinking the same thing?

I did not have to read the content, just looking at the pictures, my tears started running down. I ask the school headmaster and the teachers: Do you even see the girl standing outside the door?

Regardless in which city in China, migrant workers are always the lowest class, the most bullied people. There is [officially] no tuition fee nationwide, but I still have to pay 500-600 RMB a semester for my child to go to school in Puning City [in Jieyang, Guangdong province]. Migrant workers just suffer bullying. This kind of teacher should have been expelled from the teaching corps long ago. This little girl is so sad. Bastard teachers, if she were your child, how would you feel?

First figure out whether the local department of education really has this kind of regulation. If it really does, then find out whether there are schools admitting children of migrant workers. This society does not pity tears. Asking for help is not as good as helping yourself.

The only thing that is a bigger failure than the Chinese football [soccer] team is the Chinese education system. What is it that makes those who have received educations have such cold hearts?

Nobody said peasants are bad. Peasants can stay home and plant fields. Why do they want to come to the cities to be migrant workers? All she needs to do to go to school is go home, no one is stripping her of her right to an education. The reason she cannot go to school is entirely a result of her parents coming to work in the city for their own personal benefits.

Comments on Mop:

I always thought compulsory education was real…[I was] “very foolish, very naive“…

The people suffering the most in China are actually not the migrant workers,

but their children.

This damn system system of China’s…sigh, there is nothing left for me to say…

Beginning from when we are small, we have heard, seen, and been told that socialism is good. But after growing up, we have no idea where socialism is good!!

In China, the education system has never been fair and just, there is not much reason to be so angry.

Just live numbly in this country.

Talk about human rights are all lies.

Americans say we don’t have human rights. Do we still need to refute it?

People always say that the foreigners look down on us Chinese, but now even Chinese look down on their own people, so how can others respect us?

If it were me, standing outside like that while the other students were inside attending class, I do not know how I would feel. Such a little child, and letting her suffer how unfair this society is, it is too pitiful.

Comments on Tianya:

What were the parents thinking? Why did they bring her into this world, to let her suffer, and her young soul suffer mutilation.

Seeing the child’s longing, I can’t stop the tears from flowing down my face. What kind of society is this, that would let such little child suffer such unfairness and discrimination? Where is the “harmony?” [China’s government repeatedly emphasizes a “harmonious” society for China.]

It reminds me of the phrase “Chinese and dogs are not allowed to enter!”

I don’t know whether I am qualified to talk about education here. I am not an expert, I am just a normal student at a no-name university, so my view on education may not be mature. It may even be extreme, so please don’t laugh at me, and if I am wrong, I hope everyone can be tolerant. When we were in primary school, teacher told the students to keep their hands behind their back, their heads held high, and their chest out. We did a we were told and listened to the teacher. Not making mistakes was what makes a good child, so whatever the teacher said, that is what we did; whatever the teacher taught, that is what we learned. If our grades were not bad, and if we tested into a good junior high or a good high school, then we would be deeply grateful to the teacher. When I got to university, in the midst of different events and activities, I finally realised I did not know how to do anything, that I had to think on my own, and it was very difficult to have my own ideas. It was then that I realized that we have already lost our creativity. Who should be blamed? I think the teachers are innocent, and the blame lies on the whole society’s education system. Look at our graduating students. All of them are the same, there is no personality. When I say personality is not about dressing fashionably or or behaving weird, but about the ways they think about problems, a type of attitude about life. Today’s students are all premature, their way of handling things appears to be smooth and mature. In reality, it is not, because these were all copied from others and not what they came to understand themselves. This can also be called education and learning with Chinese characteristics. Everyone says China is a strong manufacturing country, but it is not strong country in research and development. I think it is definitely not a problem of technology, but to a great extent it is because our education methods have imprisoned our thinking, and restricted our development. What we students are most skilled at is not thinking but learning, learning other people’s methods. Normally when we are working, we wait for other people to teach, and then become like masters after we have learned. I think China will never become strong relying on these methods. Maybe what I say is not all fair and sound, but the actual situation is basically like that. Someone said that one’s thinking determines one’s life, that is to say, whatever level of thinking you reach will determine what your life will be like. I really approve of this kind of of saying. Indeed, the type of education a person, a society, and a country receives will directly relate to that country’s rise and fall, success and failure.

Now that society has become like this, who should we blame? The people’s living standard has risen somewhat, but whose standard has risen the most? While we have gained something on the materialistic level, have we not also lost something at the same time? These things, who should we blame?

What would you do? Do you let this one girl go to this school or should the rules be followed because there are reasons for the rules? – Fauna

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