New political SAT worries Chinese

BEIJING — “SAT reform causes worry of ideology intrusion,” China’s official Xinhua News Agency wrote this week.

Earlier this year, the U.S. College Board amended its syllabus for its Scholastic Assessment Test, or SAT, to include reading passages from the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Students will be expected to learn about the values of “freedom, justice and human dignity,” the College Board said, not only as “a way to develop valuable college and career readiness skills but also an opportunity to reflect on and deeply engage with issues and concerns central to informed citizenship.”

Exams will also test students on what the College Board calls the Great Global Conversation based on those values — through the ideas of Martin Luther King Jr. and Mohandas Gandhi, as well as through essays by Henry David Thoreau on civil disobedience or by Elizabeth Cady Stanton on women’s suffrage.

In Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post newspaper, SAT coach Kelly Yang wrote that the new test will instill American values into “impressionable young Chinese minds.”

“In some ways. the U.S. College Board has created a test as un-Chinese as they come,” wrote Yang, a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley and Harvard Law School, adding that “hundreds of thousands of students all over China will be poring over the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights with the same zeal and tenacity they once reserved for quadratic equations.”

She wrote, “If the new SAT succeeds, it will be the first time America is able to systematically shape the views, beliefs and ideologies of hundreds of thousands of Chinese students every year, not through a popular television show or a politician’s speaking tour, but through what the Chinese care about most — exams.”

The changes are global, but they come at a sensitive time in China, since new President Xi Jinping has specifically instructed the Communist Party to guard against “political perils” embodied in Western values such as democracy, civil society and press freedom. Little wonder that Xinhua, which rigidly adheres to the party line at all times, was a little concerned.

On social media, some Netizens echoed that concern, suggesting that the test was an American attempt to brainwash people. But others mocked the authorities for being worried, arguing that Chinese students had been inculcated with official propaganda since birth.

“Now you wet your pants out of fear of a U.S. test? Isn’t that a little bit too unconfident?” one asked.

“Only you are allowed to brainwash? Not anyone else,” another asked the Chinese government.

In any case, the concerns are probably exaggerated. The number of Chinese students enrolled in U.S. colleges has nearly tripled in the past five years, reaching 235,597 in 2012-2013, without any sign that the surge in foreign study has become a direct threat to Communist Party rule.

As Elizabeth Economy at the Council on Foreign Relations pointed out in a recent blog post, “The educational histories of some of the United States’ strongest critics in China are replete with time spent in the United States,” while many of those who most appreciate what the American system has to offer end up staying in the United States after their studies.

In the end, even Xinhua concluded that the test probably won’t change anything much in China just yet.

“We have been studying in China for 12 years,” Tang Anran, a 20-year-old Beijing woman and Ohio State University student, told Xinhua. “Several months of test preparation will change nothing. We learn knowledge for the exam, and after that, we forget it.”

“Don’t worry,” said Li Kaisheng, a deputy researcher at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, posting on a microblogging service. “The habit Chinese students have formed is that they only memorize things but not absorb them. They forget about everything once the test is over.”

Talk to us

> Give us your news tips.

> Send us a letter to the editor.

> More Herald contact information.

More in Local News

A firefighter stands in silence before a panel bearing the names of L. John Regelbrugge and Kris Regelbrugge during the ten-year remembrance of the Oso landslide on Friday, March 22, 2024, at the Oso Landslide Memorial in Oso, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
‘Flood of emotions’ as Oso Landslide Memorial opens on 10th anniversary

Friends, family and first responders held a moment of silence at 10:37 a.m. at the new 2-acre memorial off Highway 530.

Julie Petersen poses for a photo with images of her sister Christina Jefferds and Jefferds’ grand daughter Sanoah Violet Huestis next to a memorial for Sanoah at her home on March 20, 2024 in Arlington, Washington. Peterson wears her sister’s favorite color and one of her bangles. (Annie Barker / The Herald)
‘It just all came down’: An oral history of the Oso mudslide

Ten years later, The Daily Herald spoke with dozens of people — first responders, family, survivors — touched by the deadliest slide in U.S. history.

Victims of the Oso mudslide on March 22, 2014. (Courtesy photos)
Remembering the 43 lives lost in the Oso mudslide

The slide wiped out a neighborhood along Highway 530 in 2014. “Even though you feel like you’re alone in your grief, you’re really not.”

Director Lucia Schmit, right, and Deputy Director Dara Salmon inside the Snohomish County Department of Emergency Management on Friday, March 8, 2024, in Everett, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
How Oso slide changed local emergency response ‘on virtually every level’

“In a decade, we have just really, really advanced,” through hard-earned lessons applied to the pandemic, floods and opioids.

Ron and Gail Thompson at their home on Monday, March 4, 2024 in Oso, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
In shadow of scarred Oso hillside, mudslide’s wounds still feel fresh

Locals reflected on living with grief and finding meaning in the wake of a catastrophe “nothing like you can ever imagine” in 2014.

Starbucks employee Zach Gabelein outside of the Mill Creek location where he works on Friday, Feb. 23, 2024 in Mill Creek, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
Mill Creek Starbucks votes 21-1 to form union

“We obviously are kind of on the high of that win,” store bargaining delegate Zach Gabelein said.

Lynnwood police respond to a collision on highway 99 at 176 street SW. (Photo provided by Lynnwood Police)
Southbound lanes on Highway 99 reopen after crash

The crash, on Highway 99 at 176th Street SW, blocked traffic for over an hour. Traffic was diverted to 168th Street SW.

The view of Mountain Loop Mine out the window of a second floor classroom at Fairmount Elementary on Wednesday, Jan. 10, 2024 in Everett, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
County: Everett mining yard violated order to halt work next to school

At least 10 reports accused OMA Construction of violating a stop-work order next to Fairmount Elementary. A judge will hear the case.

Imagine Children's Museum's incoming CEO, Elizabeth "Elee" Wood. (Photo provided by Imagine Children's Museum)
Imagine Children’s Museum in Everett to welcome new CEO

Nancy Johnson, who has led Imagine Children’s Museum in Everett for 25 years, will retire in June.

Kelli Littlejohn, who was 11 when her older sister Melissa Lee was murdered, speaks to a group of investigators and deputies to thank them for bringing closure to her family after over 30 years on Thursday, March 28, 2024, at Snohomish County Superior Court in Everett, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
‘She can rest in peace’: Jury convicts Bothell man in 1993 killing

Even after police arrested Alan Dean in 2020, it was unclear if he would stand trial. He was convicted Thursday in the murder of Melissa Lee, 15.

Ariel Garcia, 4, was last seen Wednesday morning in an apartment in the 4800 block of Vesper Dr. (Photo provided by Everett Police)
Search underway to find missing Everett child, 4

Ariel Garcia was last seen Wednesday morning at an apartment in the 4800 block of Vesper Drive.

The rezoned property, seen here from the Hillside Vista luxury development, is surrounded on two sides by modern neighborhoods Monday, March 25, 2024, in Lake Stevens, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
Despite petition, Lake Stevens OKs rezone for new 96-home development

The change faced resistance from some residents, who worried about the effects of more density in the neighborhood.

Support local journalism

If you value local news, make a gift now to support the trusted journalism you get in The Daily Herald. Donations processed in this system are not tax deductible.