With a large population living in deep poverty, Gansu province is one of the major provinces in the country faced with the serious challenge of poverty reduction. Since 2012, Gansu has taken a series of targeted measures to alleviate poverty through education, including implementing ten special support plans, establishing a big data platform, providing support for rural teachers, improving school facilities in poor areas, and increasing efforts to support students in those areas with a view to ensuring that not a single student drop out because of poverty.

This year’s National Education Conference set out a clear roadmap for pushing forward targeted poverty alleviation through education. Gansu will follow this guidance and take more measures, including:

(i) Ensuring educational expenditure the biggest item on the provincial public budget;

(ii) Focusing on the “last mile” by developing different solutions for different cities, counties, households and students;

(iii) Reducing the persistent high drop-out rates in compulsory education in Linxia and Gannan prefectures by opening more boarding schools and giving mandarin courses in kindergartens;

(iv) Investing more on school facilities and teacher capacity building, and promoting the sharing of teaching resources; and

(v) Speeding up the development of national model zones for poverty alleviation through education.