ERIC, a doctoral student at a local university, considered it to be no more than a joke when he learnt from a newspaper during the Spring Festival that nine doctoral students from an unspecified university had "fired" their tutor because the professor had asked the students to work for his own company in exchange for meagre wages.

The young man's first reaction was that it was a common phenomenon for professors to start their own companies, and it has also been an open secret that postgraduates worked for their tutors.

"It was only unheard-of that nine doctoral students would rebel against their tutor because of this," he said.

To him, the small article was just seasoning adding spice to an otherwise dull Spring Festival in his hometown outside Shanghai.

However, by the time he encountered the story once again recently, it has turned into an earthquake in the higher educational field, as well as creating a stir in society more generally.

Detailed stories were published which gave the name of the unlucky professor and the institution he taught at - Wang Yongcheng, a professor from Shanghai Jiaotong University.

"The matter has become a hot media topic, yet the key problem is how to maintain a balance between students and tutors," he said.

Eric's opinion is also echoed by a doctoral student from Shanghai Jiaotong University called Jim.

"In fact, even if students get only small payments from their tutors, many students would accept as long as the work involved can be connected to their studies," he said.

Jim described the scandal as "fun" for on-lookers, saying that the controversy had a certain inevitability.

Cheap work force

"Too many tutors have their own companies and carry out business unrelated to their teaching and research, with students on hand as a cheap work force," he said.

"Therefore, students were being exploited in a way that did not comply with a teacher's duty."

Although it is widely believed that students could progress through practice by helping with work in a project organized by a tutor, a major problem confusing some students was that some of this work was of no value.

According to Jim, not all projects initiated by their professors were helpful to student's research, with many of the projects being of no more than business value to the tutors. Thus, the students could not compose essays based on the work. Furthermore, they could sometimes fail to finish their studies in time due to the additional workload.

Adding to the sense of exploitation was the fact that a project worth 100,000 yuan (US$12,100) to a professor might yield only 2,000 yuan (US$242) for a student worker. "Students would complain of course," Jim said.

Presently Shanghai Jiaotong University requires doctoral students in the sciences to publish high-quality essays, at least one of which should be catalogued by the Science Citation Index (SCI) or the Engineering Index (EI), two of the world's leading references in the fields of science and technology.

"Yet some tutors have never written papers that have been catalogued by SCI," he explained.

Professors' headaches

However, tutors may also have their headaches.

"Funds for research are strictly limited, and universities provide only a small part of the sums required," Eric said.

His tutor mentioned that he regularly spent around 8,000 yuan (US$966) on each doctoral student out of money raised by his side projects.

"That is to say the subsidies paid to students from the university itself are insufficient," he said.

"In fact, we should not pour all our scorn onto the professors, students can also be lured by money."

Presently, it is not rare for students to engage in "moonlighting" work, skipping classes even though universities have repeatedly stressed that this violates campus rules.

"It is very obvious that professors who do not have any side-projects find it difficult to attract students for postgraduate work," he said.

To Mei Shudong, who returned to China last year after receiving his master's degree from Japan's Osaka University, such a thing is almost impossible in Japan.

"Investment in education is guaranteed there," he said. "In Japan, around US$500 million would be pumped into my university every year, which seems an incredible figure at a university in China."

In Japan, as he said, a professor enjoys high social status and wins wide respect in society.

"It would never be necessary for a professor in Japan to open a company," he added.

Tang Anguo, an expert on higher education from East China Normal University pointed out that the scandal had revealed some sticky problems in many universities.

"A major concern is a lack of funds," he said. "Also, recruitment of postgraduates has kept growing sharply, so the number of students has expanded out of all proportion to that of tutors."

Tutor with more than 20 postgraduates can easily be found in many universities. Such situations have aroused doubts about the quality of postgraduate education.

"The tutor may not have enough time to direct each of the 20 students," he said.

Meanwhile, some problems in the recruitment phase may affect a student's future study.

Tang explained that each tutor had his or her own research orientation, and a student could choose a tutor according to his or her own strong points in research.

"However, for some reasons, such as quotas, students may not end up with the tutors they desire," he said. "In order to be enrolled, some students have to change their orientation. All these factors might lead to troubles in future studies."