Something missing at school ... pupils
Print Edition
Wang Ruqiang walks around classrooms that were once alive with chattering pupils, but today only two people turn up for class, Wang — the school principal, teacher, chef and cleaner — and pupil Gao Long.
At Liugou Primary School, which is 60 kilometers from Guyuan in northwest China’s Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, a bustling new school year is nothing but a distant memory. And this is not an isolated case, over 15 percent of Guyuan City’s rural schools have fewer than 10 pupils.
Although Liugou village has a registered population of over 800, only 100 people actually live there. Most children attend school in towns or cities with their migrant worker parents.
China’s migrant population reached 245 million by the end of 2013, more than a sixth of the total population. Over 60 percent of children aged between 6 and 15 live with their migrant worker parents.
In 2013, there were 266,300 primary and junior high schools, 15,500 fewer than the previous year. In the same year, there were 21.26 million children attending rural primary and junior high schools, down more than 1.44 million.
Worried about future
In the five years that Wang has worked at his school, he has watched pupil numbers dwindling from 18 to one. Understandably, he is worried about the future of his school.
Wu Liying, a teacher in Pingshan County in north China’s Hebei Province, witnessed his school close as pupil numbers dropped from over 20 in 1996 to one in 2013. The last one left the village with his parents this year.
“I was transferred to another village school. I don’t know when I will move again,” said Wu.
Liu Guoying, head of the county’s education bureau, said it once had more than 700 schools, but now there are only 260 and 60 only have one teacher.
Even rural schools with good facilities and highly qualified teachers encounter the same problem.
“Everything is ready except we are short of students,” said Chen Wenmou, principal of Xiyuan Primary & Middle School in Xianyou County in Fujian Province.
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