University launches poverty-relief programs

East China Normal University launched 70 programs on the first day of the new year to help impoverished areas with poverty relief via raising the quality of their education.

The move is part of its 70th anniversary celebrations this year and the 100th anniversary of the Communist Party of China.

The programs were selected from suggestions of alumni working in basic education in China’s central and western areas. The issues raised include expanding quality education resources, improving teacher training and school conditions, and establishing educational cooperation platforms.

They include one from Ye Haiyan to help the Little Swallow Kindergarten in Wenjing Town in the Jingdong Yi Autonomous County of Yunnan Province. The university’s school of open learning and education is to provide infrastructure, teaching materials and training for its teachers.

Other programs range from developing demonstration classes of lab experiments and designing special courses to inspire students’ interest in learning to providing guidance in psychological education and career planning, and research into left-behind children in rural areas.