China's national university entrance examination system has long been hailed as an effective mechanism to ensure equal education opportunities for all students, but a recent admissions scandal has exposed many flaws as well as laying bare its vulnerability to power abuse and corruption.

The widely publicized scandal has also triggered serious doubts about the government's call for higher education institutions to become profit-oriented businesses.

China Central Television (CCTV) reported last Friday that three employees of the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics (Beihang) had extorted at least 550,000 yuan (US$67,000) from seven students in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

Pang Hongbing, Gao Feng and Liu Fangping allegedly threatened to deprive the students of their admissions to the university, even though they had earlier enrolled. In a recorded phone conversation with CCTV reporters, Pang said other students were waiting to fill their places.

Pang and Gao are the general manager and deputy manager respectively of Tianhong Electronic Science and Technology Co. Ltd, a company affiliated with the university. Liu is an employee of the company.

The case was reported to local police when the three attempted to extort 100,000 yuan (US$12,000) from the parents of a female student named Li, of Nanning, the capital city of Guangxi.

Pang and Gao have been released after questioning by police and Liu remains in custody in Nanning.

Pledging a full investigation, Beihang President Li Wei also made a public apology, saying he was deeply ashamed and that the scandal had damaged the reputation of the country's university admission procedures. He said the money had been refunded to the students.

Meanwhile, the university officials in charge of admissions have been suspended pending further investigation.

"I hope the scandal in Guangxi is an isolated incident in nationwide university student admissions," Li told the media.

It was not.

The People’s Daily reported on August 17 that the Xi'an Conservatory of Music in northwest China's Shaanxi Province had asked for 30,000 yuan (US$3,620) from each enrolled student. The students who refused to pay were also threatened with the withdrawal of their admission notices, according to the newspaper.

Some critics claim these incidents merely expose the tip of the iceberg of malpractice and corruption affecting university admission procedures.

The scandals have indicated a number of loopholes in the university admission system, including lack of transparency and supervision, lax management and poor quality of personnel.

Insiders say that many irregular practices have long existed in the national university admission procedure.

Some admissions personnel have profited from selling to disqualified recruits enrollment quotas reserved for students of minority groups and those with selected specialties.

Media reports said last year the top two students admitted by the Department of Arts in Hainan University in 2002 knew little or nothing about drawing. Admissions personnel of the university were suspected of taking bribes from the two students.

An Yang, who once worked in national university admissions, told the China Youth Daily that the system has been suffering widely from corruption.

"Accepting a bribe has been a very common phenomenon in university admissions, but the bribe might not always involve cash," An wrote in a commentary. "It has been an open secret in all universities that an admissions job is a lucrative post."

He revealed that some admissions workers have their dining and travel expenses paid by the parents of enrolled students and sometimes openly demand expensive gifts from them.

An indicated that corruption has rapidly evolved into the open extortion of money, in part because education authorities have failed to give proper attention to standards in admissions work.

"The absence of effective supervision and restriction over their power seems to breed corruption," said An.

Although Beihang described the scandal as an isolated act by the three employees members, critics say that does not mean the university administration office can shirk its responsibility for the misconduct.

The Ministry of Education requires all universities to send admission notices directly to enrolled students through the post, but the admissions office at Beihang agreed to let Pang deliver the notices to six students in Guangxi by hand. It provided him ample opportunities to blackmail them.

Following the revelation of the Beihang scandal, the Ministry of Education issued an urgent notice forbidding any extra fees to be charged on enrolled students during the process of admission.

Any unit in violation of the order will be severely punished, the notice warned.

As a major effort to stem the "back door" practice of securing advantages through connections, the ministry began to phase out online admission as early as the late 1990s.

Meanwhile, it also ordered the publication of the details concerning outstanding students who are permitted to go to university without taking the national entrance exam.

Media commentator Jiang Xin asserts that still more work has to be done.

He believes that the main reason for the scandal still lies in the lack of openness and transparency. With little information open to the public, the national university entrance examination system has been shrouded in mystery. Most people lack legal channels to learn more about the admissions procedure and can do nothing but wait for notification from admissions officers.

"Given the lack of information, some national university admissions procedures have become an 'information black hole,' in which some information that should be made available to the public has been blacked out," Jiang said.

He suggested that more information about examination scores, admissions procedures and personnel should be subject to public supervision.

"Internal supervision within the education system itself is too weak to ensure equity in university admission," Jiang stated.

Despite its shortcomings, the national university entrance examination system is considered the last line of defense for education equality in China.

"But the line of defense is sadly being eaten into by corruption in admissions," said an editorial of the China Youth Daily. It went on to warn that admissions corruption will undermine educational equality, which is the basis for social equality.

Those born in rich and powerful families will unjustly enjoy more opportunities than their counterparts from poor families unless admission corruption can be checked, it said.

"What's more worrying is that admissions corruption presents the dark side of society to high school graduates, and this will have a negative impact on their concept of a fair and just society as well affecting their early life," the editorial said.

Professor Lao Kaisheng of Beijing Normal University blamed admission corruption on the marketization of education.

"Scores used to be the only decisive factor in university admissions, which was completely free from the influence of market factors," said Lao, director of the Institute of Education Policy and Legal Studies. "But now some market practices have been eating into admissions."

The government has been bent on establishing the education market, but its efforts to regulate it have been left wanting, according to Lao.

He suggested the practice of selling educational opportunities for money should be eradicated through sound regulation and management.

"We can prevent such admission corruption if we can actively respond to the rapid changes in the education sector and set up an effective mechanism," he said.