China orders halt to history tests for students seeking credits for US university courses
- Test centres confirm they have been told to suspend Advanced Placement tests from next year
- Advanced courses and exams in science, mathematics and other subjects remain unaffected, they say
Beijing on Thursday ordered a suspension of history exams run by a US non-profit organisation for students seeking credit at American colleges, as the ruling Communist Party cracks down on educational material it deems unfriendly.
The suspension of Advanced Placement (AP) tests will hit secondary school students looking to ease the academic workload at US universities by earning credits for some college courses, enabling them to graduate faster.
Five test centres across the cities of Beijing, Guangzhou, Nanjing and Shanghai confirmed they would suspend the tests by 2020, after a directive from China’s Ministry of Education.
“This is a bit sudden, we don’t know the reason,” a Nanjing-based centre, SAT Test Web, said on social media platform WeChat. “If you apply for any of these four subjects, it means you need to go to other exams outside the mainland.”
The tests affected were in US history, world history, European history and human geography, said the International Exchange and Cooperation Centre in Educational Measurement (IECC), a Chinese body authorised to administer the exams.