Project Hope has enabled more than 2.6 million poor dropouts in
China's rural areas to return to school and continue their
education since its launch in October 1989, said Tu Meng, deputy
secretary-general of the China Youth Development Foundation (CYDF).
Tu acknowledged that a total of 11,000 Project Hope primary schools
have been set up in the countryside since the first one was opened
in eastern Anhui Province in October, 1989.
Project Hope plans to finance 15,000 students from migrant farmer
worker families in 27 cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and
Nanjing to go to school during the second half of this year.
The project has improved the education conditions in China's
poverty-stricken areas and provided education opportunities to
millions of needy school-age children, according to statistics from
CYDF.
China faces serious challenges in providing universal education to
its population of 1.3 billion and particularly to its rural
population despite steady progress made in this field over the past
years.
In some outlying mountain regions and areas inhabited by ethnic
minorities, many children of needy families still cannot afford to
go to school, and every year about one million pupils drop out of
school to help support the family.
CYDF launched Project Hope in October 1989 with the purpose of
helping poor school age children in rural areas to complete primary
school education.
Since its inauguration, Project Hope has received more than 2.2
billion yuan (some US$265 million) in donations from domestic and
overseas sources including individuals, government organizations
and major transnational corporations.
(Xinhua News Agency October 14, 2004)