Music and fine arts will be integrated with the high school entrance exam as a pilot scheme in Jiangsu province for 2017, in order to assess students’ artistic qualities, according to officials.

Huaian will be the first city to implement the policy for its high school entrance exam this year. Students will have to answer a page testing knowledge of music and fine art, with a score of 100, accounting for 10 percent of the final result.

Jiangsu capital Nanjing will be the next to implement the new policy in 2020. Some parents have claimed that the extra testing might overload students, preparing for the critical entrance exams.

However, Zhang Yuanguan, director of the Education Bureau of Huaian, said that the artistic tests will only center on basic knowledge closely related to textbooks which all students are already required to read.

“I am very supportive of this policy, which will benefit all students by stimulating schools to optimize their artistic curriculums,” said Yan Gongda, vice chairman of Chinese Calligraphers’ Association.