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Revision as of 17:46, 11 April 2009 by Rjanag (talk | contribs) (→Description: copyedit, rearrange)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff) "Liu Yiting" redirects here. It is a Chinese name; the family name is Liu.Template:Contains Chinese text
 The cover of Harvard Girl, showing Liu with her Harvard acceptance letter. | |
| Author | Liu Weihua, Zhang Xinwu |
|---|---|
| Language | Chinese |
| Genre | Parenting |
| Publisher | 作家出版社 (Writer Publishing House) |
| Publication date | 2000 |
| Publication place | People's Republic of China |
| Pages | 384 |
| ISBN | 750631942X |
Harvard Girl (full title Harvard Girl Liu Yiting: a character training record; Chinese: 哈佛女孩刘亦婷: 素质培养纪实; pinyin: Hāfó Nǚhái Liú Yìtíng: sùzhì péixùn jìshí) is a book written by Liu Weihua and Zhang Xinwu, which describes how they raised their daughter, Liu Yiting (simplified Chinese: 刘亦婷), to be accepted to Harvard University. Published in 2000 in Chinese, the book details the rigorous lifestyle that Liu led and includes advice from Liu's parents on how to raise children to gain acceptance to top-tier universities; it has been described as a "manual" for child-rearing and early education. The book was a bestseller in mainland China and made both Harvard and Liu Yiting household names among Chinese parents and students. It has since had numerous imitators, spawning an entire genre of how-to books on child-rearing for Chinese parents.
Liu Yiting
Liu was raised in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province. Liu's parents, believers in the value of early childhood education, subjected her to a rigorous education beginning when she was only 15 days old. For example, to ensure that someone was always talking to Liu, they invited relatives over to the house. They also had her participate in "character-building" physical exercises such as swimming, jumping rope, and holding ice in her hands for extended periods of time. In addition to these, Liu acted in a soap opera when she was five years old.
While in high school, Liu participated in a student exchange program and visited America in 1998; this experience changed her views about life in America and made her aware that in American universities, she would be able to study a variety of subjects. After returning from the exchange program, she decided to go to American universities. Although they had been training her to attend a preeminent university, Liu's parents had not expected that she would attend an American one; her mother has said that she had not been aware (until Liu came back from America) that Chinese students could apply to American universities. At the time, it was unusual for Chinese students to attend American schools as undergraduates—most only applied to schools abroad for postgraduate education. But rather than taking the gaokao (China's national college entrance examination) and attending one of the National Key Universities, Liu applied to several schools and was accepted with scholarship offers to three or four Ivy League universities. She ultimately chose to attend Harvard University, where she was accepted with a full scholarship. Not long afterwards, a local newspaper announced her acceptance and the family was "besieged with thousands of phone calls".
At Harvard, Liu majored in applied mathematics and economics and earned high grades; she also chaired the Harvard Project for Asian and International Relations, a student organization. She was described as an "unassuming" and "typical student", to the point that her roommate did not realize for four years that she was a celebrity in China. In 2003, Liu graduated and took a job at the Boston Consulting Group in New York City.
Description
Liu Weihua (Liu's mother) and Zhang Xinwu (Liu's stepfather) published Harvard Girl in 2000, after Liu had matriculated at Harvard. According to Liu, her parents had plans early on to write about their parenting methods, but they waited until 2000 to publish the book, relying on Liu's perceived success to establish themselves as "experts". The book primarily consists of research-like notes and diary entries, which Liu and her parents began recording and saving before Liu was in first grade. Liu herself helped edit the book.
One major element of the child-rearing strategy described in the book was treating Liu as an adult and "encourag her to develop a mature style of thinking". Liu's parents never used baby talk when Liu was a child, and they allowed her to argue with them but required her to present reasoned arguments like an adult. According to education scholar Ben Mardell, the book's focus on independent thinking and intellectual development was a "break with the past" in China, where both early and higher education often emphasize rote learning.
In addition, the book details the rigorous "character-building exercises" Liu's parents had her perform. In addition to having her do physical exercises, Liu's parents controlled her diet. They also frequently took her traveling, both on short trips to nearby rural areas and on longer trips to historical sites such as Xi'an. Throughout the book, high value is placed on "full development", and the writers encourage parents to cultivate more than just academic ability in their children.
The book also includes supplementary chapters on topics such as how to select which schools to apply to, and advice for students on filling out applications and taking TOEFL and SAT exams.
Impact
The book was at the top of China's bestseller for 16 months, during which time it sold at least 1.5 million copies and the writers were estimated to have earned at least the equivalent of $100,000 in royalties. It became a must-have book for middle-class parents in China. The popularity of Harvard Girl made Liu a "national superstar", and she frequently received fan mail and drew large crowds at book signings in mainland China. The success of this and similar books (another bestseller in 2001 and 2002 was Robert Kiyosaki's Rich Dad Poor Dad) in mainland China has been said to reflect a "national obsession" among Chinese parents to get their children into top-ranking American schools.
Harvard Girl was followed by numerous imitations by parents of other successful students, and is said to have spawned an entire genre of education "manuals" for Chinese parents, including similar books on how to get one's children into schools such as Oxford University, Cambridge University, or Columbia University. This genre includes titles such as Ivy League is Not a Dream, From Andover to Harvard, How We Got Our Child Into Yale, Harvard Family Instruction, The Door of the Elite, Harvard Boy Zhang Zhaomu, Harvard Talents: Children Cultivated by the Karl Weter Educational Law, Tokyo University Boy, Cornell Girl, and Our Dumb Little Boy Goes to Cambridge. Comparable books have also been published in South Korea, although American undergraduate universities are not "revered" in the same way there as they are in mainland China.
On the other hand, the book has been criticized for increasing the pressure many Chinese students already had to succeed in school, and for taking advantage of the widespread belief that admission into leading universities is necessary for success in life. Some critics have called the book "boastful". Many successful Chinese students after Liu have tried to distance themselves from the so-called "Harvard Girl Phenomenon"; Harvard students Yin Zhongrui and Tang Meijie have both stated they do not want to be compared to "Harvard Girl". Yin's mother published a book, From Andover to Harvard, about how her son was accepted by Harvard, but Yin only allowed his full name to appear in the book's preface. Tang received at least six offers from publishers to have a book written about her, but declined them all.
The book also had an impact on applications to Harvard. It made Harvard a household name in China, and books of this genre caused a significant increase in the number of Chinese applicants to top-tier American universities. In 1999, when Liu applied to Harvard, a total of 44 Chinese students applied there—in 2008, 484 did.
See also
Notes
- The exact number of sales is unclear; while it had sold about 1.5 million copies through the publisher by early 2003, it was estimated that 2 million more pirated copies were sold in the same time period (Lin-Liu 2003).
References
- ^ "Best Sellers Reflecting Chinese's Life Interests". Xinhua. 21 November 2001.
{{cite news}}:|access-date=requires|url=(help) - ^ Levenson, Eugenia V. (2002). "Harvard Girl". Harvard Magazine. Retrieved 19 February 2009.
- ^ Jan, Tracy (4 January 2009). "In China, Ivy League dreams weigh heavily on students". The Boston Globe. Retrieved 19 February 2009. Also accessible at International Herald Tribune.
- ^ Marshall, Andrew (17 February 2003). "How Harvard Came Calling". TIME Asia. Retrieved 19 February 2009.
- ^ Lin-Liu, Jen (30 May 2003). "China's 'Harvard Girl'". The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved 19 February 2009.
- ^ Ng, I-Ching Florence (3 August 2002). "Smart thinking creates a recipe for success". South China Morning Post.
{{cite news}}:|access-date=requires|url=(help) - ^ Schauble, John (6 May 2002). "US school story a huge Chinese hit". The Age. Retrieved 10 April 2009.
- ^ Meyer, Mahlan (29 December 2002). "Crimson China: Why the People's Republic is Mad for Harvard". The Boston Globe.
{{cite news}}:|access-date=requires|url=(help) - ^ Wang Ying and Zhou Lulu (7 December 2006). "From Asia with Love: How undergrads from the Pacific Rim are writing about Harvard in their native languages". The Harvard Crimson. Retrieved 19 February 2009.
- Kantrowitz, Barbara (15 September 2003). "Learning the Hard Way". Newsweek. p. p. 2. Retrieved 10 April 2009.
{{cite web}}:|page=has extra text (help) - ^ Zhao, Yilu (14 April 2002). "BOOKS; Dr. Spock, Where Are You?". The New York Times. Retrieved 10 April 2009.
- Rekhi, Shefali (20 May 2002). "Readers' concerns: How to get rich; Management and self-help books are the region's bestsellers with readers seeking new opportunities as Asia liberalises". The Straits Times.
{{cite news}}:|access-date=requires|url=(help) - Friedman, Tom (2005). The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century. Farrar Straus & Giroux. ISBN 0374292884.
In 1999, Yiting Liu, a schoolgirl from Chengdu, China, was accepted to Harvard on a full scholarship. Her parents then wrote a build-your-own handbook about how they managed to prepare their daughter to get accepted to Harvard. The book, in Chinese, titled Harvard Girl Yiting Liu, offered 'scientifically proven methods' to get your Chinese child into Harvard. The book became a runaway bestseller in China. By 2003 it had sold some 3 million copies and spawned more than a dozen copycat books about how to get your child into Columbia, Oxford, or Cambridge.
- ^ Nguyen, Toan (22 January 2009). "Hot for Harvard". The Phillipian. Retrieved 19 February 2009.
- Hulbert, Anne (1 April 2007). "Re-Education". The New York Times. Retrieved 19 February 2009. Also accessible at International Herald Tribune.