BEIJING, Jan. 5 (Xinhuanet) -- The Ministry of Education's New Year message offered fresh hope with its claim that it will do its best to improve educational management and, in particular, stop random overcharges.

    The past year has proved to be one of controversy for our educators as the problems of overcharges and standards of college tuition, among others, continue to draw public criticism.

    These problems have tarnished the image of education as serving to promote the well-being of our nation with quality, affordable education for our children.

    From the message given by Education Minister Zhou Ji at the New Year's ministerial meeting, the ministry is determined to take action to pacify the public.

    Zhou said that this year the ministry will help poor students tap financing channels to gain access to education and make colleges improve management to provide better, accountable service.

    Whether those political promises are fulfilled will largely determine public confidence in the ministry.

    The problem is that the ministry has made many similar pledges in the past and conducted repeated nationwide checks to curb overcharging, but these have, unfortunately, seen little fruit.

    This time, the ministry must find some new and more effective methods to bring home to the public that it is able to carry out what it has promised.

    What is new in its working plans for 2007 is that it will draft a unified system of cost accounting to govern college tuition collection. Without such a clear set of standards, the tuition collection has continued to arouse public questions.

    Educators admit that it is quite challenging to determine how much they should charge their students. Ironically, the current tuition standards, lacking a solid accounting basis, have been in place for many years, despite ongoing public complaints.

    The ministry must improve its pace in drafting the accounting system to redress past irregularities.

    And more importantly, the draft versions of the new system must be made public before they are finalized to see whether they are in touch with reality.

    Meanwhile, efficiency-centered reform of universities must be accelerated to enable them to operate with lower costs.

    (Source: China Daily)