Beyond the Gaokao: A Mother Discusses Paths to Tsinghua University

Besides the Gaokao, there are 32 other ways to get into Tsinghua.

How? I only found out the day before yesterday.

It's just that… the moment I found out, I felt…

I was angry. I felt as if, for the past 32 years, I had been kept in the dark.

Two years ago, I happened to meet a girl.

She got pregnant around the same time as me.

Not long after she found out she was pregnant, she went to the US and stayed there until she gave birth before coming back.

From the surface, based on my understanding at that time, maybe it was just for a US green card.

I thought, "What's so good about a US green card anyway?"

Right. Only later did I find out. That feeling…

I don't know if it was anger, or maybe I was angry at my own ignorance.

Didn't I say that besides the Gaokao, there are 32 other ways to get into Tsinghua?

One of them is the special policy for students from Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, and international students.

That is, if you are a non-Chinese citizen, a foreign national, you have special policies to get into Tsinghua.

You don't have to study yourself to death to get a score of around 700.

At that moment, I felt like for the past 30-plus years, I had been completely kept in the dark.

The education we received since childhood was: "You must study hard, you must work hard," "so that you can get into Tsinghua."

Actually, there are many other ways. There's also participating in winter and summer camps, targeted training, and competitions.

32 ways in total. If you hadn't mentioned it today, I wouldn't have known either.

But this information is all public. It's not like you need a special identity or some special channel to be able to see it.

It is public. It's just that I only found out in my 30s.

That's the gap. At that moment, I realized my horizon and my cognition determine my son's baseline.

So I don't push my kid. If I want to bring him to a broader platform, I have to push myself.