On September 25, Yan Zongmin, principal of Kangjie Middle School in Yuncheng, Shanxi, responded to recent controversies: he stated that staggered holidays during the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day were due to poor communication; admitted that the national flag was not raised to the top during the flag-raising ceremony and that the September 18 warning education was poorly handled; and claimed that the blackboard newspaper text was verified by the police as being self-created by students, reading phrases like "Long live Comrade Mao Zedong," while adding that the students' method of posting notes to express demands was unacceptable and that the police had intervened in the investigation.