A 17-Year-Old Prestigious School Student in Zhengzhou Kills His Mother to Escape Study Pressure
After the incident, he said he "did not regret" his actions, exposing the wounds of exam-oriented education. In the western part of Zhengzhou, the provincial capital of Henan Province, there is a prestigious high school. This prestigious school is favored by parents and students alike for its annual hundreds of students admitted to key universities. Many junior high school graduates take pride in being admitted to this school.
On February 22nd, at noon, a reporter from the Legal Daily saw many parents waiting to pick up their children at the gate of this prestigious school. One parent told the reporter: "My child has heavy study responsibilities, I pick him up to eat something good at home and replenish some nutrition."
Some of them did not know that on February 7th, the second day after the Lantern Festival, Cheng Cai (a pseudonym), a sophomore at this prestigious school, killed his own mother at home.
The 17-year-old Cheng Cai confessed to the motive for killing, saying: "I don't have to study anymore, I don't have to bear such great pressure."
On February 22nd, the People's Procuratorate of Zhongyuan District, Zhengzhou City, approved the arrest of Cheng Cai on suspicion of intentional homicide.
The academic trajectory of a good student
Cheng Cai was born on January 16, 1995, in a worker's family in Zhengzhou. In the eyes of his parents, he was very excellent with good academic performance; relatives and neighbors all spoke highly of him.
After finishing elementary school, Cheng Cai attended a prestigious local junior high school. In 2010, he was admitted to a prestigious high school.
As soon as Cheng Cai started high school, his mother, Ms. Guo, rented a place near the school and moved the family closer. The purpose was to be closer to the school for his convenience in attending classes.
Ms. Guo devoted all her energy to her son. She would ride an electric scooter to send her son to school after breakfast in the morning; pick him up after school at noon, have lunch, and then send him off again; and pick him up after evening self-study at 10 PM.
The family's expenses were entirely supported by Cheng Cai's father who worked as a worker. To ensure his son's studies, Ms. Guo lived frugally. During her son's spare time from regular studies, she enrolled him in tutoring classes.
"Mom signed me up for four tutoring classes - one for Chinese, one for math, one for English, and one for physics. By the time of this winter vacation, it changed to two chemistry classes, one Chinese class, one math class, and one English class. The entire winter vacation was spent in tutoring. Before the Spring Festival, we tutored until the 28th day of the 12th lunar month, and then resumed tutoring on the fifth day of the first lunar month after the New Year. The few days in between were spent writing homework at home," Cheng Cai said after the incident.
Cheng Cai performed well in school and was even the physical education committee member of his class. His class was a physics competition class, where the students' academic performances were all quite excellent. Cheng Cai's best exam result placed him 21st in his class and 91st in the entire school. Even when he didn't perform well, he could still rank within the top 300 in the school. According to the teachers' statements: "Students ranked within the top 600 in our school are considered to have relatively good grades and can attend key universities."