Job Discussion Forums

[wangdaning]

But this experience you attribute to western people only accounts for a small percent. How many people are in "student council, debate club, competitive sports, drama club etc" in the West. I know I wasn't in any groups or sports.

For many Western students life has now become about doing the things to get into a good university, like a good gaokao score. These activities are in many cases not natural interests to the students, but something they must do, are forced to do, are expected to do. It takes up most of their time, and when it is done it is usually left behind. (Reading is not really a verifiable interest).

As far as understanding themselves and what they want, well, they are about at the same level as their Chinese counterparts.

My example of the writing class might not have been so clear. The problem with many of my classmates was the inability to think for themselves. We often romanticize our experiences and I think many people tend to do that with their education. Academically the students at my university were great. However, most tended to simply absorb things and not react to them. They also lacked experience with life outside of television. Their experiences were what their mom/dad expect and what they saw on tv.

It is a very small minority of first year university students who are actually ready to do it. I think Chinese students get a bad wrap because many people have skewed expectations. They are not you in university, they are John Doe, the guy you never met.

[dean_a_jones]