After reading my post about Reed College’s horrible treatment of Chris Langan, a friend of mine who is a student at Tsinghua University wrote this:
I feel so lucky that we have lots of brilliant scholars who are at the same time good teachers. Many of them do care about undergraduates and give good advice. I don’t know which education system for undergrads [Tsinghua’s or Reed’s] is best, for colleges that do poorly in educating undergrads [like Reed] may produce students who are more independent. But being educated here, I have to say I love Tsinghua and its teachers a lot.
Why does she love Tsinghua? I asked.
I think it is very tolerant. I made many mistakes while I was growing up, but just like my parents, my school didn’t forced me to do anything to correct my mistakes. It gave me freedom to choose, to live my own life. I’m glad it didn’t interrupt my life and gave me the chance to see my mistakes and to correct them by myself. And when I did want to correct them, it allowed me to. I realize that there won’t be many chances to make mistakes and to correct them by myself after I leave school so I value the time in the school. So I guess the best thing about Tsinghua is its freedom and tolerance.
My friend started as a math major. Then she became an English major. Now she is taking economics classes because she wants to study economics in graduate school. That’s what she means by “mistakes”: choosing the wrong major.