Chinese teacher-trainee fails qualification test due to her height
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A Chinese teacher-trainee failed to pass a regional teacher qualification exam due to her lack of height.
Identified only by her surname, student Li received word that she failed the qualification exam because she did not meet the required height of 1.5 meters, or four feet 11 inches. Li only stood 1.4 meters or 4 feet 4 inches, reports Cnwest.com via South China Morning Post.
Male teachers also have a height requirement of 1.55 meters or 5 feet. These requirements had been put in place by the Shaanxi province education department. On a national level, there is no height requirement, but provinces may enact their own rules.
Li’s failure at the qualification exam holds a serious problem for her, because she may end up breaching the agreement of her scholarship. Students who wish to get a scholarship for a teaching degree sign contracts in universities to become public teachers when they graduate. In return, the universities cover their tuition fees and living expenses. Li entered Shaanxi Normal University in 2014 as an English major student.
“The university should have informed me four years ago when I was admitted,” said Li in the report.
Meanwhile, an education department official surnamed Yang said there were reasons for the height requirement and they would handle Li’s case accordingly. She also said her department have asked universities to inform incoming students of the height requirements.
There are plans to drop the height requirements permanently by 2019. Other provinces that have removed the height requirements for teachers include Guangxi, Jiangxi and Sichuan. Alfred Bayle/JB
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