Governments across China, especially those in the disaster-affected areas, have taken prompt measures to help students back to school as the new school year started Monday.

In Beijing, the national capital, about 1.7 million middle school students returned to school after a five-week summer vacation.

Owing to the outbreak of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), Beijing's primary and middle schools had all been shut since April 24 and students had to study at home through the Internet and television education programs for over two months before schools resumed at the end of June.

Zhang Xinyi, from southwestern China's Chongqing Municipality, started junior middle school year in Beijing Monday.

"I came from afar to study in Beijing four years ago and my teachers are very nice to me," said Zhang, one of the 160,000 "floating" children in Beijing, who travel from elsewhere in China and have to pay an extra fee to study in the capital city as they have no residence registration.

To guarantee all the "floating" kids get an education, the Beijing municipal government has decided to reduce the extra fees and postponed tuition payments.

In flood-stricken areas, like east China's Jiangsu and Anhui provinces, all the schools opened as scheduled.

Officials of the educational department in Anhui Province, east China, said that nearly 100,000 school buildings were damaged to varying degrees in flooding of the Huaihe River in summer, the worst in 12 years.

Local governments have done their utmost to repair school buildings while arranging for the students to study at schools nearby.

In addition, work groups comprised of government officials and school teachers have been dispatched to the hard-hit areas to look into disaster situations, and the students who had difficulty paying schooling fees can enjoy a partial or total tuition waiver.

"Had not my teacher told me that I can have a tuition fee waiver, I would have quit school and gone to work in Ningbo city, in east China's Zhejiang Province, with my relatives," said Zhang Yang, a student of Chuigang Middle School in Yingshang county in Anhui Province.

Meanwhile, in earthquake-affected Ar Horqin Banner, north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, on Monday, the Central School of Gangtai Town held a flag-raising ceremony for the new semester in front of more than 100 tents that were being used as temporary classrooms.

The quake, measuring 5.9 on the Richter scale, occurred on Aug.16, destroying all the 45 classrooms in the school.

Meng Zhaokun, the headmaster, said more than 620 students had registered Monday and the rest, who lived further away, were expected to arrive at school the next day.

"In addition, to reduce and remit the tuition fees, over 130 teachers of the school are ready to donate 100 yuan (US$12) each to the needy students," said Meng.

As the cold weather approaches, however, the tent school is expected to operate till the end of October.

"With the help of local government, we are trying to rent or borrow houses for classrooms," said Meng.
 
 (Xinhua News Agency September 2, 2003)