University Entrance Exam 入学考试

[chinabro]

Hey,
I'm not really sure to post this since it's a very general question, but I'll post here since I will be attending Yunnan Daxue.

I am currently in the middle of applying to the univeristy and they have told me I will have to do a Entrance exam 入学考试 in August of this year.
My course will be a bachelor of Sociology taught in Chinese. So as far as I know the exam will also be in Chinese.
The person I am in contact with has said it's similar to the 高考 in layout, but MUCH easier for foreigners.
I'm still a little worried since it's going to be in Chinese and I've never learned Maths, Geography, History in CHINESE language.
I've done NEW HSK4 with almost full marks and this is their only requirement. But since HSK doesn't involve anything to do with Geography/history etc. I'm sure I wouldn't be able to understand anything related to it.

Does anyone have experience doing this exam?
Preferably those who have done the exam in Chinese. Was it difficult? Is it something that requires preparation and study?
Is it easy to pass (perhaps just some auto-pass exam for foreigners), or is it actually designed to weed out the less capable students?


(Also if this is the wrong place to post, please move to more relevant area - I'm afraid this post won't see many views in Kunming sub-topic)

thanks

[anonymoose]

I did the entrance exam for Fudan University a few years ago. There were actually four exams - Chinese, English, Mathematics and Science.

 

I think the exams are actually not that easy - but of course, I have no idea what the pass mark is.

 

Certainly, you will need to have reasonable Chinese to cope with the exams, and the content in the exams is not exactly elementary either. I suggest you try to get a syllabus from them, and past papers if possible.

 

Having said that, obviously they earn money from foreign students, so it's not in their interest to reject you. I think you'd probably have to do fairly dismally to not be accepted.

[edelweis]

what happens if you "fail"?

do they have a program of remedial or preparatory classes maybe?

if so, you need to consider the expense and delay of spending one or two additional semesters in China...

[chinabro]

I do have some faith in the attitude of rolling the red carpet out to foreigners, but I'd feel uncomfortable relying on this alone. Also, I'd love to be able to prepare for the test. My desire is to take the course in Chinese so I'd like to be capable of the entrance exam at least.
I'm pretty worried about not being able to understand anything. I recently had a look at a year 6 exam that Chinese students apparently take before they enter high school. I could barely understand anything on the paper.
I still have two months before the exam and am willing to hardcore study for it. I'd rather not spend a full semester preparing for it - although that may be a better idea.

It's just really hard to find any information on it.

The person at the uni helping me with my application said this after I told them I was worried about the exam's difficulty and would like an example paper.
"对不起，我们没有样题，每年都有专门的老师命题，

历史地理组成文科综合考试，主要是一些中国和世界历史，地理方面的简单知识，谢谢！"

I guess their intention is to assure me it's going to be pretty easy. But in my experience Chinese people totally overestimate HSK levels and so I'm concerned this is another person who assumes any level of HSK = god level mandarin. It also doesn't console me to hear that its "一些中国和世界历史" as if China and the World are known for their short and simple histories.

@anonymoose
From your experience was the exam in a multiple choice style or did it require some longer answers. I'd be pretty comfortable with multiple choice or short answers. At least there is room for a lot of guess work. Can I ask why your exam involved English? Assuming your test and course were in Chinese, why did they need to test your English level?

[rezaf]

There is always a fixed 题库 where they choose the questions from and it doesn't change much in years. Of course you can't ask them directly because it would be illegal for them to give it to you but you have to find other students who have taken the exam and see if they have anything useful.

[anonymoose]

From your experience was the exam in a multiple choice style or did it require some longer answers. I'd be pretty comfortable with multiple choice or short answers. At least there is room for a lot of guess work. Can I ask why your exam involved English? Assuming your test and course were in Chinese, why did they need to test your English level?

 

As far as I recall, it included multiple choice, but it wasn't exclusively multiple choice. It did require written answers, but nothing long like essays. Maybe just a couple of sentences here and there.

 

There are standard entry requirements for students. Maybe different universities have their own systems, but for Fudan, I think they basically split their subjects into arts and science, and for science, the standard exams are Chinese, English, Maths and Science, and for arts, Chinese, English, probably Maths (but I'm not sure) and something else (not Science). In China, regardless of what subject you are studying, all students are expected to take English, at least during the first year. If you are a native speaker of English, they may allow you to take Chinese (for foreigners) instead. So students need a certain level of English, regardless of what they are studying. Also, not all foreign students are native English speakers. In fact, at Fudan, Koreans probably constitute the largest group of foreign undergraduates.

[chinabro]

I'm getting closer to the exam but I haven't really been able to do anything to prepare. For now I am just focusing on Chinese so that at least I will be able to understand the test. But I'm a little afraid I won't actually be able to handle the content, even if it was in English.

For Geography and History I'm at least confident in my general knowledge of it. But for maths, it's been 5-6 years since I graduated high school and haven't needed to use it since that time. I'm sure there are a lot of problems I would have totally forgotten how to approach. Assuming this test will be more than just simple things like interpreting graphs, I'm a little concerned.

Could anyone give me a summary of the kind of maths that would GENERALLY be expected before entering an undergraduate degree. I guess this question can apply to any and all universities around the world. I'm thinking of just brushing up on what would most likely come up.

@admin:
Could this question be moved somewhere where it will get more exposure? I guess it's more of a general question but I couldn't really find a general uni sub-forum

[anonymoose]

If I remember correctly, the maths in the Fudan entrance exam certainly wasn't what I'd call elementary. I'm sure it did include some simple stuff, but as far as I recall, it also had things like complex numbers, matrices, series, range and domain and so on. I don't think it had calculus, but I'm not sure.