UNIVERSITIES and colleges in China will no longer be allowed to expel married students who get pregnant or give birth, according to a statement posted on the Web site of the country’s family planning regulator Friday.

However, pregnant students will be encouraged to suspend their studies to ensure they stay healthy, said the joint statement by China’s National Population and Family Planning Commission, Ministry of Education and Ministry of Public Security.

Universities and colleges must also strengthen family planning education including contraception, the statement said.

Schools are being asked to tell their students to focus more on their studies and be cautious about love affairs and marriage.

Early last year, a dismissed medical college student won a discrimination case against her school for expelling her because she gave birth while still taking courses.

Wang Hongjie won the suit and got her master’s degree from Mudanjiang Medical College in northeastern China’s Heilongjiang Province.

Under Chinese law, women can marry at 20 and men at 22. But normally only marriages between women over 23 and men over 25 are officially encouraged.

Students were forbidden to marry until the law was changed in September 2005.

The statement also requires colleges to hire people to help married students on campus.

Students who give birth will be issued with certificates after they have registered their baby with colleges, and the information on the certificate will be recorded on the students’ personnel files.(SD-Agencies)