Editor,
I could not agree more with your article "Suicide cases ring alarm bell."
(March 3). I want to air my views on why suicide cases happen with such a high
frequency.
It was heartbreaking and appalling news that a college student in Chengdu,
capital city of Southwest China's Sichuan Province, committed suicide days ago.
Everything has a reason. It was reported that his failure to pass the CET4
(College English Test) directly led him to kill himself. The predominant factor
is that he suffered great psychological problems.
The story is really upsetting and regretful, but by no means is it an
isolated incident. Every year, students kill themselves for various reasons. It
is a great loss as the young are the future of our country. The tragedy again
reminds us to be alert and makes us ponder why students choose to die because of
such small troubles. We only have one chance at life, so why do not they cherish
it? This indicates that we may neglect the psychological education of our
children, revealing loopholes in today's educational system.
For a long time, parents and schools have paid little attention to children's
mentality. What we stress most is that they should get high marks and get
enrolled at first-class high schools and universities.
There are more suicide cases related to exam failures than any other reason.
It is hard to place blame on just one culprit for such tragedies, but
parents, teachers, students and the entire society should shoulder
responsibility. To some extend, they all contributed to the tragic scenes.
The tragic loss of life highlights the significance and urgency of
reinforcing psychological education and reversing the methodology we use to
educate young people. To foster the young in a scientific and proper way is a
must so that this type of tragedy does not happen.
Our government has put forward the concept of "quality education" for many
years, but the exam-oriented education has not yet fundamentally changed. It has
forced schools to put overwhelming emphasis on textbooks and ignore aspects such
as morality and ethics.
Many appear psychologically vulnerable when encountering little setbacks.
Sometimes even a small failure will be enough to lead them to crash.
Wu Yifei, Xi'an
(China Daily 04/05/2006 page4)
