Xichuan education continues upward

The authorities in Nanyang's Xichuan county held a meeting on Teachers' Day to award several grants in recognition of outstanding educational achievements, Sept 10.

The most prestigious among these grants were the six communities deemed educationally advanced. They will receive a total of 7 million yuan ($1.05 million). The authorities have also recognized a further seven model communities for their commitment to education and 28 outstanding education institutions for their focused sculpting of young minds. Xichuan county also took time to acknowledge 10 teachers who have demonstrated high levels of diligence and professionalism.

Xichuan has greatly improved the quality of its education in recent years. These efforts have involved the recruitment of an additional 645 highly qualified teachers, providing teachers with special training, and creating education summer camps to ensure that learning is a year-round affair. Xichuan has certainly reaped the benefits of these practices with this year's gaokao achieving widely praised results; 447 students received offers from first-tier universities, 1,327 from second-tier universities and 2,321 from third-tier universities.

However, the Xichuan authorities are not content to rest on their laurels and will endeavor to continually improve local education. The government has already applied for over 90 million yuan and has raised nearly 100 million yuan for the purposes of benefiting 170 educational projects, improving the quality of teaching, and upgrading a range of educational environments.