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The university president received 20,000 text messages from students after he gave out his mobile phone number

2023-06-16

A barrage of over 20,000 short messages have bombarded a college president's personal cellphone in the last two school years since he disclosed his phone number publicly to deal with student suggestions.

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Kong Jianyi, president of Wuhan Technology and Business University, revealed the figure — which equates to about 30 per day — during a graduation ceremony speech on Friday in Wuhan, Hubei province.

Kong made his phone number public during his address to the opening ceremony for the new semester in September 2021 and has since been receiving SMS messages. They contain complaints, requests and suggestions of all sorts. Kong said that he promised to personally reply to all the messages and turned reasonable suggestions into reality.

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For instance, one freshman asked him how to get up early for morning jogs. Kong replied that he had since gone jogging every morning whenever he was on campus to set a good example for the students.

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"It's really tiring to reply to all these messages by myself, but it's worth it because the communication is heartfelt and I have learned about the university's drawbacks, allowing me to improve the campus," Kong said during his speech.

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Some messages have been more tongue-in-cheek. One student wrote: "Mr. President, some other university presidents are giving students free roasted chicken, I want some, too."

The university later gave away 18,000 chicken drumstick rice set meals and a mealbox of crayfish to its faculty and students to celebrate its 20th anniversary, which draw laughter and garnered thumbs-ups from students.

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