Li Changchun, a senior Communist Party of China (CPC) official, urged college students on Saturday to further improve their ideological and political education.

"The CPC Central Committee with Hu Jintao as the general secretary attaches great importance to the ideological and political education of college students and has made a series of major policy decisions. We must firmly carry out these decisions,"Li told a symposium on ideological and political education of college students held in Guangdong.

Li, who is a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, called for improving college classes of ideological and political education, fostering a wholesome campus culture, further improving management and services, and strengthening the teaching staff for the mission.

He also urged reinforcing and improving construction of collegeInternet websites and firmly controlling the influence of the Internet on the minds of college students.

Party and government organizations at various levels should assume their political responsibilities and enhance leadership over the ideological and political education of college students, he said, adding that the whole society should also work jointly tofoster a congenial environment.

"Public cultural facilities and patriotic education bases should open to visiting groups of college students free of charge," he said.

A Party and government document issued jointly in October acknowledges that "a number of weak links exist in the ideological and political education of college students in the face of profound changes of the international and domestic situations."

Among some of the eminent issues, a growing number of students no longer live in campus dorms but instead rent private rooms; worries among young undergraduates grow as they have to hunt for jobs themselves; and Internet pornography and on-line games "make inroads into the minds" of quite a few college students and negatively affect their academic pursuits.