China Prep

China Prep is a video I recently watched on PBS.  It's not so much about someone preparing to go to China, but rather it's about high school students in China getting ready to take the exam of a lifetime.  This is the exam that students in China take to find out whether they will become wildly successful, mildly successful, or ... not so much.  The exam is for seniors in high school.  It should be noted, that to get into high school -- theres another exam students take 4 years earlier -- that one also determines quite a bit about where each student will go in life.

During the senior year of high school, and for some -- the years leading up to it, students are essentially expected to study 16 hrs a day 7 days a week.  There are times laid out for sleeping, eating, learning, and occasionally stretching to compliment the excessive studying.  The success of each student is incredibly important for the parents of each student because of the one child policy and retirement options.  It is very traditional in China for the grandparents to be taken care of by the parents and live in home.  As a child grows up and gets to having a career, they begin to support their parents and grandparents.  One way to look at it would be that the parents really want their child to do well because the child is their retirement plan.  Each set of parents only has one chance at a good retirement because of the one child policy.  It's an interesting system, different than home for sure.  It's not really a bad system, clearly it works well for the Chinese and if thats how they want to do it, then go for it.

Anyways, the video is interesting and really shows some unique hardships for students as they go through their senior year in high school.  Another interesting piece of the video is part 3 of 3 with Venessa Fong.  It really highlights the different policies between the two countries.

Also note the new gadget on the left, google voice.  It works. It really does call me.  You can try it, it asks for your phone number because it will call you, have you answer -- then it will try to ring me.