An educator devoted to enlightenment

Students enjoy cherry blossoms at Wuhan University. Asianewsphoto

He has a hearing problem, and his right hand shakes. Yet, Liu Daoyu, in his 70s, still works four hours a day.

The former president of Wuhan University likes to share his thoughts on higher education in China.

His latest opinions were expressed in a 7,000-word article in China's Southern Weekend newspaper in February, when he called for an overhaul of the country's crowded universities.

Higher education suffers from too much bureaucracy, he said during a recent interview in a humble apartment where he lives on the Wuhan University campus.

"China's education system awaits a movement of enlightenment," Liu said.

History lesson

Born in a village of northern Hubei province, Liu studied chemistry at Wuhan University in 1953.

Before 1949, the campus was ranked as one of the top five universities in China.

But the university's reputation quickly declined after 1953.

"Professors were terrified. Some were sent to the gymnasium to receive physical punishment, and nobody was in the mood to pursue research," Liu recalled.

The university's ranking slid to 22nd place among 23 universities under the supervision of the Ministry of Education.

Liu became a chemistry lecturer when he graduated in 1957.

The university sent him to the Soviet Union for further studies at the Soviet Academy of Sciences in 1962.

"Unlike what I had expected, postgraduate studies in the former Soviet Union were markedly independent and democratic," Liu said.

Liu attributed the academic freedoms in the Soviet Union to its western cultural background, which "tallied with my personality, as well," he said.

In 1973, ten years after teaching at Wuhan University, he was named a deputy Party chief at the university.

Four years later, he became chief of the higher education department of the Ministry of Education in Beijing.

But Liu resigned in 1979 to return to his alma mater and teaching.

Era of reform

Liu was named president of Wuhan University in 1981. In the prime of his life, the young leader began implementing reforms.

The university introduced academic credits, double majors and a tutorial system, none of which had been tried in China's universities since 1949.

He also led the effort to abolish political instructors, whose mission was to oversee the students' ideology.

The system had been established in the 1960s when "class struggle" was a dominant theme, he said.

"Obviously, such a practice was already out of date, so we cut it off," Liu said.

More than 400 student societies were formed, and inter-disciplinary study discussions became the norm.

"We infused a spirit of openness and democracy into the campus," Liu said.

Liu's bold reforms made the university a magnet for students from other campuses, he said.

The reforms also served as a catalyst for scientific research.

In 1985, Wuhan University won nine national first prizes and rose to second place among Ministry of Education-supervised universities - behind only Peking University.

Life's mission

Liu, busy preparing for the second phase of his blueprint for reform at Wuhan University, was unprepared when he received a notice in 1988.

At the age of 54, Liu learned he was being removed from his post due to a "routine election," he said.

Liu's departure from the university did not deter what had become a life's ambition, to promote improvements in the country's higher education system.

Liu turned his focus to theoretical research in higher education.

"China boasts the biggest college population, the largest campuses and is the second biggest academic paper generator in the world, but it can barely foster a world-class scholar or a school of thought," Liu said.

"Why? We are used to taking students as raw materials that could be shaped along a standardized production line imposed by the educational management regime. A sad result is that their personalities and ability to innovate are eroded," he said.

To Liu, the higher education system should be left to educators, and universities should strive to maintain academic freedoms.

Liu said Southwest Associated University in the 1930s attracted 172 academicians, including two Nobel Prize laureates (Tsung-Dao Lee and Chenning Yang).

"The miracle simply lies in the freedom it enjoyed," Liu said.

Xinhua

(China Daily 07/13/2009 page10)