Pingtan county has fine-tuned its policies concerning the high school entrance exam, said the local education authorities on March 26.

The primary change comes at exam time, which has been shortened from three days to two and a half days from June 10 to 12.

The exams for physics and chemistry will be moved to the morning of June 12, while ethics and history exams will take place on the afternoon of June 12 instead.

The exam time length of history will be cut by half an hour with less content as well.

Another major change is that candidates who received a C in ethics, physics and chemistry will be able to apply to top-tier high schools in Fuzhou and Pingtan. Previously, they had to obtain a B or above to be qualified.

Second and third-tier high schools have also lowered thresholds on some subjects for the candidates.

What’s more, there will be more high school freshmen from target areas. For example, Pingtan No 1 Middle School is slated to admit 216 students from special zones, accounting for 45 percent of the total enrollment capacity compared with 42.5 percent last year.