CHINA: Authorities shut down more than 20 schools for the children of migrant workers around Beijing

Record ID: 348248

  • Title: CHINA: Authorities shut down more than 20 schools for the children of migrant workers around Beijing
  • Date: 19th August 2011
  • Summary: BEIJING, CHINA (FILE - AUGUST 2010) (REUTERS) BUILDING SITE MIGRANT CONSTRUCTION WORKERS ON SCAFFOLDING WORKER CROUCHING
  • Embargoed: 3rd September 2011 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: China, China
  • Country: China
  • Topics: Domestic Politics,Education
  • Reuters ID: LVA58XMKSKED9ZLO1KF1GGC5C67W
  • Story Text: The children of China's tens of millions of migrant workers have long found education in privately-run schools like Dongba Experimental School, far out in Beijing's suburbs.
    For just over 1,000 yuan (160 US dollars) a year, they have received an education they may otherwise have been deprived due to strict rules that prevent outside residents attending local schools.
    But in recent weeks, China has shut down more than 20 migrant schools in the capital, forcing more than 14,000 students to drop out, state media said, and sparking fury among parents.
    Officials told Dongba and other schools that they had not met safety and hygiene standards, and would have to close, some just weeks before the start of the new school year in September.
    Dongba started its semester two weeks early to prevent its school from being demolished, and refused to go quietly, said principal Yang Qin (pron: yang chin).
    "Our contract has not come to an end, so we still have the right to be here. It is not possible for us to leave. These buildings are mine, and I still have them for another two years. So we are going to stay put," said Yang.
    In a move to push them out, the local government cut water and power to the building. The school retaliated by renting a generator and are bringing in water themselves.
    Yang has also enrolled 300 students for next semester, though this falls far short of the 1,300 who used to attend the school.
    Ten-year-old Zhang Junchao (pron: jang jun-chaw), who hails from Henan, China's most populous province, was sad to go.
    "This school is great and the teachers are very good to us. If I couldn't study here I would be really sad. Because I have really deep feelings for the teachers, and also have good relationships with the other students," he said.
    China's residence permit, or hukou, system, which channels most welfare, housing support and healthcare to urban residents, means that migrant workers do not have access to state-subsidised schools.
    While the government has said they will relocate the children at Dongba to other schools, parents say they cannot afford to move or send their children the long distances.
    The only option for most people is to send their children back to their villages, splitting up the family.
    An anxious crowd of parents waited at the end of the day on Wednesday (August 17) to take children back to tiny rented homes in the makeshift village that surrounds the school.
    Xue Qingmei (pron: shooeh ching-may ) lives with her 14-year-old son in a tiny shack next to the school. Fourty-four-year-old Xue worries that if her son stops school now, it will be the end of his education.
    "The other schools are miles away. Who can take my child there and back? None of us parents have the money to get them there and back. So none of us want our children to go there. Plus, they're not public schools, they're private too. Why can they carry on while this school closes? What they are doing doesn't make any sense at all. All of us parents are furious," she said.
    Some, like the New Hope School on the other side of Beijing, have already been destroyed, with just a few days warning.
    The government there has not promised students new places at other schools.
    Peng Jian, a lawyer representing a student at one of the schools, held documents showing that many schools had passed safety inspections as recently as last year.
    He said by closing the schools, the authorities were violating their own laws as many students under sixteen would end up without education.
    "Getting an education is not just a right, it is obliged by law. So what is actually happening here - the widespread, senseless closure of these private schools - will violate the right to education of some of these students," he said.
    The overwhelming majority of China's 150 million rural migrant workers see their future in the cities and towns they have helped build and maintain.
    But they are often treated as unwelcome "interlopers" and have few rights.
    The State Council Development Research Center, a top state think-tank, warned that unless the migrants have better welfare, housing and legal status in urban areas, their discontent could turn into a serious threat to stability.
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