Recently online news stories and chat rooms are filled with people debating an issue that is encapsulated in a photo shot on campus in central China's Hunan Province: A domestic cleaner tidies a campus dorm while a student sits at a desk surfing the Internet.

In this undated photo a domestic cleaner tidies a campus dorm while a student sits at a desk surfing the Internet on campus in central China's Hunan Province.

The manager of a local domestic service provider, surnamed Zhan, said since the new school year began, most of their customers were college students. "Most of them were girls and they don't care what the price is, they almost never try to bargain," Zhan told the Changcha Evening News.

Even with the booming business, Zhan is not happy. She didn't expect college students to make up the majority of her customers. She is worried that college students, touted as elites, will not be able to be responsible for society if they even can't even be responsible for their dorms.

Zhan's company is not the only one experiencing the boom. Another domestic service company reported receiving several dorm-cleaning orders a day and sometimes they had to refuse orders because there were too many.

The students, however, think they are too busy to clean their rooms, and take the service for granted. "The dorm has been messy since the summer holiday and everyone now is busy with schoolwork, post-graduate exams or job-hunting," said a junior waiting for a domestic cleaner in her messy dorm cluttered with personal belongings¡£

Another student said hiring domestic helpers was very popular on campus and roommates could split the expense, usually about four to nine yuan per person.

In addition to new-semester cleaning, there are also regular orders. A six people living in a campus dorm room in Northwest China's Chengdu pay 360 yuan per month for a domestic cleaner to clean the room and do their laundry once a week, , according to the Qianjiang Evening News.

Still many are wondering if it is acceptable for college students, most of who still rely on their parents, to pay for domestic help simply for the reason of "busy" instead of doing it themselves.

"It is convenient. We are tired after the long trip back from our hometowns at the beginning of the new semester," a Hunan University sophomore told Changcha Evening News.

An art design student at Hunan Normal University explained to the paper that it is both fair and easy to hire workers because it is difficult for roommates to share cleaning duties.

Some parents echoed these thoughts. "It will be ok if the children can concentrate on their school work and this kind of thing does not matter much," said one, who was trying to hire a domestic helper for her child on campus.

However, a school official responsible for students' affairs strongly objected. He said it would not help students' comprehensive development, even though the school is not supposed to interfere in students' personal business.

According to a poll on sohu.com, 57 percent of netizens disapprove of the practice and said it is disgraceful for social elites to waste their parents' money and get out of doing any physical labor while those who say yes argue that it is ok if students think they can afford it because it is just a kind of consumption.

However, others had different views.

"It has nothing to do with morality," said a writer surnamed Ou, whose opinion was published in the Qianjiang Evening News.It is like the consumption of any other service students may use, he explained, except that it is a door-to-door service and it also helps create jobs for the unemployed.

He cited an example of some college girls who decided to pay more after they found the worker they had hired was in bad financial condition as her daughter was preparing for college exams.

Moreover, he said, some students use their own money from their part-time jobs, which is a sign that they have already become independent. "We can never judge the whole simply by one part," he said.

To contact the writer of this story:
Guan Xiaomeng in Beijing at guanxm@chinadaily.com.cn