China’s education system also suppresses innovation while rewarding imitation. Although some Chinese schools conduct innovative experimental education, they remain few and have little impact.From childhood to adulthood, Chinese students are subjected to rote learning—memorizing and obeying rather than questioning or thinking independently. Thus, while Chinese students and researchers excel at replication and refinement of existing work, they are poor at true creativity.
Multiple choice is, last I had awareness of it, which was admittedly several years ago now, still important to many of the most important standardized tests. They’ll have like two or three essay questions, like 10 - 20 short answer questions, and maybe 50 multiple choice questions. At least, that’s how I remember it. Of course, the open-ended ones have greater weight, I’m not saying multiple choice is rendered 25 times more important than the essay questions because it definitely is not.