Lili said she had found a person online who claimed to have official access to the answers on the math portion to the national university entrance exam. Lili admitted she was infatuated with this online person, and agreed to send him the requested RMB 4,000 payment.

Lili had memorized all the answers provided for her, but was completely shocked when she discovered while taking the test that none of the answers matched up. Lili didn’t tell anyone at first of her personal tragedy for fear of getting caught.

But Lili did eventually tell someone. Lili was interviewed by a police officer, and was also filmed on camera (as seen in the photo above).

Without the slightest betrayal of her own role as a cheater, Lili told the law enforcement official what she thought of the people who cheated her:

My future is now in doubt; this swindler is simply too heartless. Not only did he take my money, but he also destroyed my future.

And if there was any doubt at all to the moral of the story, Lili also said:

I sincerely hope that my younger classmates will be able to learn a lesson from my experience. Never, ever allow yourself to be tricked the way that I was and have your future taken away from you.

As brave as it was for Lili to come forward and serve as an example to others, the report did not mention the punishment Lili would face by confessing to a police officer that she had cheated on a national examination.

Photo: Shenzhen Evening Report via Weibo

1. The student’s father or mother must have legal and stable work in the province.

2. The student’s father or mother must have legal and stable residence in the province

3. The student’s father or mother must have a valid Guangdong residence permit for at least three consecutive years. Moreover, the expiry date of the permit must be later than the date of the entrance exam.

4. The student’s father or mother must have made social insurance contributions for at least three years.

5. The student must have sat the High School Enrolment Exam in Guangdong.

6. The student must have studied at a Guangdong high school for three years.

But that’s not where it ends. According to China Labour Bulletin, to complicate matters further, some Guangdong cities have applied additional restrictions. In Guangzhou for example, admissions for non-local high school students are capped at 10 percent of all students. While in Dongguan, students have to attend a local middle school for at least three years before they are eligible to sit the high school entrance exam.

Finally, in Shenzhen, eligibility is based on proximity to the school the student wants to attend. In other words, if the family cannot afford to live in the school’s district, which, due to rising housing costs relative to the income of migrant workers is typically the case, the student is ineligible.

Initial reports had stated that the new rules would allow the children of migrant workers to apply on “equal footing with legal residents”. It would appear there’s still a long way to go before that’s a reality.