At the inauguration of the Peking University Entrepreneur Club on Sunday, Zhou Qifeng, president of Peking University, said the institution had nurtured 79 billionaires in recent decades, the most by any university on the Chinese mainland. But there is no reason why the university to pride itself on its wealthy students, says an article on xinhuanet.com. Excerpts:

A university should neither extol nor demonize entrepreneurs or billionaires who have been its students. Universities cultivate academics and entrepreneurs both.

In Peking University's case, we have to first figure out whether the students became billionaires after passing out of the university or whether they entered it riding on the back of their or their families' wealth.

There is no reason why Peking University should pat itself on the back just because a fraction of its former students are rolling in wealth today. On the contrary, a university should be judged by the number of masters it produces in different fields.

As former president of Peking University Cai Yuanpei said almost a century ago: "The knowledge learnt from business schools is not meant to make a fortune."

It's a pity that the university has betrayed his words. What top institutions of learning like Peking University and Tsinghua University should produce are masters instead of multimillionaires.

(China Daily 06/30/2011 page9)