Another search on Chinese video sharing site Tudou for the word protest today brings this video uploaded May 24 and entitled ‘Xinhua Adult Education Institute, Students Cheated, Protest!’ in which students can be seen blocking a road and traffic backed up into the background:
Which led to this video of a smashed-up police station:
A search on Google for the school's name and ‘students cheated’ brings this account of the protest, dated May 27, copied from elsewhere and posted anonymously:
This starts on the night of May 22, 2007
Until now this school has been unable to fulfill all the promises it made to us when we came here. Now it's given rise to a large-scale riot so big in scale it's hard to imagine.
First I'll explain the reasons for the rioting.
At the time we came to this school, they told us we would be be granted graduation diplomas from Jiangsu University. They've still yet to follow through. What they gave us were graduation certificates from the Xinhua Institute school for adult education, equivalent to a high school level polytechnic diploma. This is one.
Second, the digital media major that we chose only recruits 1,300 students. Yet they continue recruiting. The school is now unable to provide those students with digital media major diplomas. The administration did this without the students’ permission and even without notifying the school, secretly having changed students’ majors.
新华骗了我们。骗了我们大家。
Xinhua has cheated us. Cheated our families.
所为才会有今天的大型爆动发生。
This is why today's large-scale riot occured.
下面我把今天下午二点到现在的情况向大家介绍一下。
Below I'll recount for everybody the events that took place today starting at 2 o'clock p.m.
A 2:15 this afternoon, class monitors from every tutorial for the classes of 2007 and 2008 were sent to represent their classmates in negotiations with the school. Not a single person from the administration showed up.
At around 2:25, with still nobody having shown up, the entire school for digital media walked out of the school and onto the road in front of campus (which happens to be the main traffic corridor in Hefei) and held a demonstration.
We closed the road, blocking all cars, creating a traffic jam. Cars were lined back for over ten kilometers.
At 4:30 that afternoon the Institute president still hadn't shown up, there was still no way to resolve the problem.
During the meeting of student representatives, one woman smashed a bottle.
学校对学生们的欺骗行为极其恶劣,数百名学生十分愤怒,暴动时间已进行了十几小时了
The school's deception of the students is extremely horrible, and hundreds of students were very furious. The riot carried on for over ten hours.
晚上六点左右。一保安动手打了一学生。学生愤怒起来。学校大门被拆,保卫科也被砸毁,
At around six in the evening one security guard started beating one student. The students became enraged and ripped the front campus gate off. The guard station was smashed and destroyed.
当地出动将近百名警察仍不见起色,学校所有的保安不知去向/
Nearly a hundred police were called out but still there was no improvement, all the campus security guards were nowhere to be found.
Now it's 7:50 at night. The student riot is still going on.
As cameras are all still being used down at the scene,
Unable to provide everybody with firsthand images.
As long as the riot continues I'll keep everyone updated.
Please everyone pay close attention.
(From the person who reposted this: this writer and I are from the same part of campus, we're watching live. At noon I'll upload some photos. Now the rioters have started a large-scale petition. They've taken the list and are heading for the city government….update coming soon)
现在新华集团把很多媒体都收买了 各大媒体不给报道
Now the Xinhua corporation has bought out many local media, none of them are reporting this.
I remember the day I first came to Xinhua, writes reader si cheng on June 1. I'll just say one thing: here at Xinhua, this is not a school. I saw that early on. I might as well have taken a computer training class. Never mind all the other…
Then in the order in which they appeared on Google, here are some of the eyewitness reports which have not or will not be deleted. First in line—a blog! Little Cloud's, which dated May 27 confirms what the anonymous writer wrote above, that students had blocked off a road by 3 pm on the 22nd, saying police, journalists and several local tv crews arrived at the scene shortly after, but claiming that Xinhua had leaned on its connections to get the story killed:
Then the sky turned black and emotions became agitated. After teachers were seen hitting students, everything turned chaotic. At last that night at just after 6, the furious students pushed down the steel door the school had erected to contain them and clashed with the guards. At the administration's call, police gradually chased students back to the school until traffic was able to move again around 7:30.
Around 8 or 9 on the evening of the 23rd the situation upgraded! Hefei city and Anhui provincial government leaders one after the otehr came down to Feidong County, Longtang Village where the Institute is located! By this point several hundred armed police had already been dispatched and ambulances were standing nearby. From what I could tell, the ambulances weren't there for fear of a fire, but to use the water cannons to break up the crowds!
Starting at 9:30 rioting began and continued steady for around another four hours! Institute administration were all in their office having a meeting, discussing countermeasures, but it didn't work! Then the Anhui provincial education minister showed up ad the school and around midnight a statement was issued to the students! (because I wasn't at the speech, I didn't hear what was said! but in the morning before class [the next day] there were notices everywhere, mostly just saying that each class needed to send two representatives to the multipurpose room to give the administration their demands)
I only just found out today at lunch after we graduate, us digital media majors are going to have “applied computer major” written on our diplomas! We students are going to go on strike, we're so angry! This applied computer major certificate is useless. Nobody out there recognizes this major because students at other universities get the same thing only us digital media majors pay several thousand more in tuition than those in other majors do (except internet engineering)! Xinhua's cheating us!
When I came to Xinhua they told use that we would get diplomas from Jiangsu University but then when after finals were over they told us we would be getting Xinhua Adult Education Institute certificates. We were so pissed off at the time!
Overall, Xinhua is nothing more than a prison which tricks people to get them in. There's no electricity in the women's dorms and they only have two hours electricity every day. The food in the cafeteria is so expensive it kills, and it tastes bad too.
It's precisely because they're not giving us our diplomas that there have been two riots, with the second much more serious than the first. The campus gate was pushed down and the school has been smashed up. The riot is still continuing.
The riot has stayed noisy throughout. Before one wave ends another picks up. On May 23 (day 2 of the riots) at around 3 in the afternoon, the digital media and art & design students gathered in front of the school's main gate, bringing all traffic to a complete halt. Very chaotic.
According to what this writer has learned, the reason students blocked the road might have to do with the discrepancy between the ultimate graduation diplomas and the ones students were promised, leaving all students unsatisfied and looking for the administration to fix the problem. It seems they were refused though, because emotions just swelled before people decided to go block the road.
The key reason, though, this writer is still looking into. There are two situations being spread around:
First:
When students entered the school they were told by administration that they would be granted associate degrees from Jiangsu University, but just before the final examinations the administration suddenly told students that two majors (digital media and art & design) would be getting Xinhua Institute certificates. At the time the students held a small-scale protest but the administration mediated before it turned ugly. But as graduation drew closer, they were told they wouldn't be getting associate degrees, but applied computer certificates. Students seemed uhappy to hear this and then things all got ugly.
Secondly:
Similar to the first, only that a new discrepancy appeared in regards to the diplomas. The rumor was that they wouldn't be getting junior college credentials but technical school credentials at the high school level. Students didn't take this lightly; they had paid several tens of thousands of Yuan after all, and not for high school level certification. Nothing they said seemed to have any effect so they went out and held a roadblock to uphold their own interests. I hope they get the right authorities’ attention.
The above two situations have not been substantiated by this writer. That's why I've written these, to get more accurate information. Those of you who know the truth please let me know!
A thread at theNetease education forum started by user qwf1986520 on May 25 tells roughly the same story, adding some details such the power being turned on just before midnight on the 22nd in the 30 degree weather, that around 2000 students spent 4 hours blocking the road on the afternoon of the 23rd starting at 1pm and that roughly 1000 students were blocked halfway during a march to city hall on the 24th. Five hundred allegedly began a silent seated protest and shortly after police began hitting students. Towards the end it's mentioned that mention of the story is being censored online and in traditional media.
I can't seem to find any reports on this online. Like Baidu, 51Space, blogs, personal websites. All the photos and video that have were uploaded have been deleted. You can see just what hard powers stand behind Xinhua!!!
There's some news from the education department: the Xinhua Adult Education Institute has violated the law in at least five places.
Inside story (reliability: 75%): One of Xinhua's largest shareholders is closely connected to Jiang Zemin‘s little sister Jiang Zehui. And Jiang Zehui herself has spent some time in Anhui but later for reasons I don't know was transferred back to Beijing. I believe Jiang Zehui herself and Xinhua are intimately connected!!
Above is what's being reported.
How the incident was resolved: on the 25th it came out that the two majors were allowed to appeal and have been given three choices.
1) Continue studying but do not receive a diploma for past studies, only for future studies and receive compensation of 3,000 yuan.
2) Immediately withdraw and the school will refund half your tuition (according to the tuition you paid) No diploma.
3) Two years of credit become one year and no diploma will be awarded but a 60% tuition refund will be given.