Yuan Guiren, Minister of Education, announced some measures to reform the NCEE, known as Gaokao, for this year in a media conference. The first measure is to balance the recruiting quota  around the nation, with particular emphasis on recruiting more students in central and western provinces. In addition to this, Yuan said that 200,000 places would be available in the universities in eastern China for students from western China. The third measure is to cancel some policies that allow students with special talents to receive extra points on their final result of the NCEE. "All national-level bonus marks for Gaokao will be cancelled in 2015, while over 60 percent of the province-level bonuses will be cut. Ten provinces have already canceled the policies while other provinces have cut down 63 percent of the policies," said Yuan. The policy was originally introduced to be aimed at making Gaokao fairer because some students have special abilities but fail to get high scores in the national exams. Yet, it has been abused by corrupt officials to get the bonus marks for their children. This is a good example of corruption ruining a good policy. Additionally, all students can recommend themselves for independent recruitment in some education institutions without any restrictions. Schools can also recommend their students to some universities. The date for independent recruitment is scheduled for after the NCEE in 2015, and universities will be required to publicize their recruiting requirements, processes and results. The last measure mentioned by Yuan is to gradually unify the NCEE around the nation. Students in three more provinces will sit for the same exams in 2015. Seven more provinces, totaling 25 provinces, will use the same exam format  in 2016. The passage is most probably taken from a(n)   _  .
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