Shanghai has spent nearly 150 million yuan (US$18.57 million) on the education of students from Tibet over the past two decades, officials from the Shanghai Education Commission revealed yesterday.

The information was released as the city celebrated the 20th anniversary of its first Tibetan student class at Shanghai Gongkang Middle School yesterday.

As an ethnic minority, Tibetan students have totally different customs from their local counterparts. The city offered special classes for Tibetan students at Shanghai Gongkang Middle School, Shanghai Huimin School and Shanghai Administrative Management School since 1985.

The commission also awarded each of the three schools 500,000 yuan to improve their facilities yesterday.

To date, the city has paid for the education of more than 2,000 Tibetan middle school students and over 700 vocational school graduates, commission officials said.

(Shanghai Daily December 22, 2005)