PKU scholar set to be dismissed

The School of Economics of China's renowned Peking University (PKU) has explained that the decision of terminating the further employment of its faculty member Xia Yeliang was made due to his poor teaching evaluation results.

The school said in a statement on Friday that a 34-member faculty committee reached the decision on October 11 by a 30-3 vote, with one abstention, during a secret ballot.

Xia, currently an associate professor with the School of Economics, started teaching there since 2002.

Xia's teaching evaluation scores had been the lowest "in recent years" and the school had received over 340 complaints on his teaching methods and attitude from students since 2006, said the statement.

Among the complaints, Xia was reported by students to have "anti-Party and anti-socialism" speeches in class.

Xia told the Global Times on Sunday that he will continue teaching until January 31, 2014, when his contract expires.

However, he suggested that the school did not give convincing details about his evaluation and questioned whether student opinions should be a key factor to judge a scholar's academic abilities.

Xia, an outspoken professor, has faced contract termination rumors for months. Around 130 faculty members at Wellesley College in the US, which has an institutional partnership with PKU, wrote an open letter in early September, asking PKU not to hold the vote against Xia.