What a Chinese university's admissions brochure must tell an international applicant

A university in mainland China must draw up and publish its own international student admissions brochure, and must recruit under the conditions and procedures that the brochure sets out (Order No. 42, Article 11). It must publish its fee items, fee standards and its refund rules for withdrawal and transfer, with both charges and refunds denominated in renminbi (Order No. 42, Article 14). It must also make its basic school information, its education and teaching situation, the brochure itself, and its international student management and service rules available to international students (Order No. 42, Article 23). A separate document, the Quality Standards for the Higher Education of International Students in China (Trial), lists six groups of information that admission information must contain at a minimum (section 2.1).

Two documents, kept apart

The first is the Measures for the Administration of Schools Recruiting and Educating International Students, Order No. 42 of the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Public Security. It was signed on 20 March 2017 and came into force on 1 July 2017 (Article 48), and its Chapters 2 to 5 apply to higher education institutions (Article 2).

The second is the Quality Standards for the Higher Education of International Students in China (Trial), issued as the attachment to Ministry of Education notice 教外〔2018〕50号. They are trial standards, and they are addressed to higher education institutions: they state what a university should set, publish or do. Where they leave a matter to the institution, that is how they read.

Both Chinese texts are quoted as published; the English wording on this page is this site's own translation of the Chinese.

What Order No. 42 requires

Article	What the university must do
Article 11	Formulate and publish its international student admissions brochure in accordance with national enrolment regulations, and recruit international students under the conditions and procedures stated in that brochure
Article 14	Publish its fee items, fee standards, and its refund rules for withdrawal and transfer; charges and refunds are denominated in renminbi
Article 23	Make available to international students its basic school information, its education and teaching situation, the admissions brochure, and its international student management and service systems, so that students can obtain the information

Two consequences follow for a reader. First, the brochure is not publicity that the university may depart from later: Article 11 ties recruitment to the conditions and procedures the brochure states. Second, the money rules are part of the same publication duty, not a separate document you have to request — fee items, fee standards and refund rules for withdrawal and transfer are all named in Article 14, in renminbi.

The six groups of information

Section 2 of the Quality Standards states that a university should publish admission-related information truthfully, accurately and comprehensively, and should act in good faith in admission publicity and counselling, so that prospective students have sufficient information to support their choice; admission and enrolment should follow principles that are standardised, open and fair.

Section 2.1 requires a university to use information technology such as the internet to provide admission information that is true, comprehensive and suited to the characteristics of international students, and to provide adequate admission counselling. The information provided should include at least the following six groups. The checkboxes are for your own use when reading a brochure.

• [ ] Basic information about the school — for example an overview of the city where the school is located, and the school's conditions for running its programmes.
• [ ] The education programmes — for example the level of study, the training objectives, the length of study, the degree awarded, and the rules on transferring to another institution or to another major.
• [ ] Admission procedure and entry requirements — for example application deadlines and methods, entry standards, examination and assessment methods, financial guarantee requirements, how violations are handled, and the admission calendar.
• [ ] Financial rules and policies — for example fee standards, payment methods, and the refund policy.
• [ ] Campus culture and life — for example the conditions of dormitories or apartments and how to apply for them, food, medical care, insurance, transport, cultural and sports activities, and student organisations.
• [ ] Counselling contact details, and channels for complaints and reporting.

Each item inside those groups is a decision the university takes and publishes in its own brochure: the length of study, the entry standards, the application deadlines, the examination method and the financial guarantee requirement are the university's to set. Nothing on this page states what any particular university has chosen.

The financial group in section 2.1 and Article 14 of Order No. 42 cover the same ground from two directions — one says fee standards, payment methods and refund policy belong in the admission information, the other says fee items, fee standards and refund rules for withdrawal and transfer must be published and must be in renminbi.

How the information has to be published

Section 17 of the Quality Standards concerns the protection of students' rights, and section 17.1 adds a form requirement: a university should publish information on admission and enrolment, teaching and training, management and services to international students in writing — in electronic or paper form — and in a way that is convenient to consult. Section 17.1 is given here in the context of national rules on information disclosure, which the section refers to.

The remaining parts of section 17 matter when the information is wrong or a decision goes against you:

• 17.2, oversight — a university should publicise, in a convenient form, the channels and methods for reporting and complaining about unlawful or irregular conduct within the institution, and should handle such reports and complaints properly.
• 17.3, appeal — where an international student is subject to a sanction or other disposition, the university should clearly inform that student of the channels and methods for appealing, and should handle appeals properly.
• 17.4, information security and privacy — a university should establish and improve relevant systems in accordance with national legal requirements and take effective measures to protect international students' personal information security and privacy.

Read together with Article 23 of Order No. 42, the shape of the duty is: the brochure, the school's basic information and its management and service rules should be reachable, and the routes for complaining and appealing should be published as well.

Using this as a checklist

This is a planning suggestion, not a rule. Work from section 2.1 first, because it is the longest list: take the six groups and go through the brochure once, marking each group as present or absent. Then check the three Order No. 42 points separately — that the brochure is the document the university recruits under (Article 11), that fee items, fee standards and refund rules are published in renminbi (Article 14), and that school information and management and service rules are available too (Article 23). Anything still missing is worth putting to the counselling contact in section 2.1 before you apply, rather than after.

If you are weighing published costs against your own budget, the funding pages of this site sit alongside this one.

Questions people ask

Does the university have to follow its own brochure?

Yes. Article 11 of Order No. 42 requires a university to formulate and publish its international student admissions brochure and to recruit international students according to the conditions and procedures the brochure prescribes.

Must fees and refunds be shown in renminbi?

Yes. Article 14 of Order No. 42 states that charging and refunding are denominated in renminbi, and that the university must publish its fee items, fee standards and its refund rules for withdrawal and transfer.

Does the admission information have to be in writing?

Yes. Section 17.1 of the Quality Standards requires the information on admission and enrolment, teaching and training, management and services to be published in electronic or paper written form, in a way that is convenient to consult.

What can I do if a brochure leaves something out?

The Quality Standards require a university to publicise, in a convenient form, the channels and methods for reporting and complaining about unlawful or irregular conduct inside the institution, and to handle reports and complaints properly (section 17.2). If you have been sanctioned, the university must clearly tell you how to appeal (section 17.3). Order No. 42, Article 23 also requires the university's international student management and service systems to be made available.

Sources

• Measures for the Administration of Schools Recruiting and Educating International Students (Order No. 42) — Ministry of Education of the PRC (moe.gov.cn)
• Quality Standards for the Higher Education of International Students in China (Trial), notice 教外〔2018〕50号 — Ministry of Education of the PRC (moe.gov.cn)
• Quality Standards for the Higher Education of International Students in China (Trial), attachment — Ministry of Education of the PRC (moe.gov.cn)

Checked 11 October 2026

This page is an unofficial summary. It is not published by, and is not affiliated with, the Ministry of Education, the China Scholarship Council, CHSI or any university, and it is not legal advice; where the official text, or the current notice of the university or authority handling your case, differs from what is written here, that official text or notice prevails.