According to a report released by Institute of Education Tsinghua University, Chinese colleges and universities lag far behind in the fields of academic challenge, cooperative learning initiative, student-teacher interaction, and so on, when compared to U.S. research universities, China Youth Daily reported.

The survey collected over 20,000 samples from 23 undergraduate institutes in China. Based on these data, three quarters of Chinese students have never discussed scores or assignments with their lecturers (whereas in same-level U.S. institutions, this applies to about 7% of students); half of the Chinese students have never talked about their career plans and thoughts with their teachers (the rate in same-level U.S. institutions is about 21%); 35.6% of the students have never got timely feedback on their academic performance from teachers (in same-level U.S. institutions, this rate is about 7%).

The report puts forward that the traditional concept of a teacher's authority exerts much influence on the interaction between teachers and students.

The survey also shows that when asked about "whether they put forward questions or participate in discussions in class", more than one fifth of Chinese students answered with "never" (in same-level U.S. institutions, this goes for only 3% of students), only one tenth of Chinese students chose to answer with "often" or "very often" (in same-level U.S. institutions, this rate is about 63%).