NEW BAIDU PRESIDENT.docVIP

NEW BAIDU PRESIDENT 　　Former Microsoft Corp. executive Lu Qi was appointed president and chief operating officer of China’s search engine giant Baidu on January 16， in a major push to help the company gain an edge in its latest profit driver―artificial intelligence. 　　Prior to joining Baidu， Lu served as Microsoft’s global executive vice president and led one of Microsoft’s three business units. Lu will oversee all of Baidu’s business units―from products and technology to sales and marketing―and report to Baidu Chairman Robin Li. 　　Lu received bachelor’s and master’s degrees in computer science from Fudan University in Shanghai and a PhD in computer science from Carnegie Mellon University in the United States. He holds over 40 U.S. patents and has authored many papers in his field. 　　 Guiding Extracurricular Training 　　Guangzhou Daily January 18 　　The size of the extracurricular training market in China reached 800 billion yuan （$116.5 billion） in 2016， with 7 million to 8 million teachers， according to a report recently published by the Chinese Society of Education. In spite of the large size， the market is plagued with multiple problems. 　　The quality of training agencies cannot be guaranteed. Teachers are key to determining the quality of training. However， there is no objective standard for judging the qualifications of teachers offering their services through training agencies. Some parents are suspicious of the overall expertise of such teachers. Moreover， such agencies often compile their own teaching materials. Whether they are useful and effective is unclear. In addition， parents are subject to the risks of training agencies closing down and running away with their money. A dozen such cases were reported nationwide in 2016. 　　Extracurricular education is complementary to full-time school education and has ample reason to exist. However， necessary supervision is required to regulate the market. The threshold for the industry should be raised. For