While the State education authority is engaged fully in popularizing nine-year compulsory education across the nation, Cheng Su is trying to convince officials that placing money into mending dilapidated school buildings and roofless classrooms in the country's western region is of equal importance.

The NPC deputy from Northwest China's Qinghai Province says in her proposal that in a large number of places where compulsory education is already enforced, classrooms are deficient. Poor conditions for living and studying and a shortage of teachers threaten the quality of education provided there.

"The problem does exist in central and western regions," Yang Jin, deputy director of the Basic Education Division under the Ministry of Education, admits.

In 2001, a nationwide project to renovate unsafe school buildings within a two-year period was launched with State funds of 3 billion yuan (US$362.7 million).

Last year, another 2 billion yuan (US$241 million) was allocated to initiate a school renovation project in rural areas in 26 provinces and autonomous regions, mostly in middle and western regions. That came in the wake of an Inner Mongolian primary school suffering the collapse of malformed roof beams last April as a class was meeting. The incident left a student dead and nine others injured.

But the bulk of the funds went to basic facilities for the establishment of compulsory education, leaving insufficient money to improve conditions of schools already set up, Cheng said.

In 2004 and January of this year, the Qinghai Democratic League Committee where Cheng works surveyed scores of schools in the province that have been covered by compulsory education.

"Most schools are short of classrooms due to increased enrolments and reduced investments by the State and local governments," she said.

For example, the 960 students in the only junior high school in Tumenguan County are squeezed into 13 classrooms, each having 72.3 pupils on average, she said.

"There isn't even space for a stove in a classroom, so students have to brave the cold winter air to study," Cheng said.

The problem may worsen next year, when the number of students is expected to increase to 1,024.

Ill-furnished dormitories where two students are jammed into one bed are common, Cheng said.

Taking safety issues into consideration, school authorities dare not put stoves inside dormitories. The long and cold winter has become a nightmare for those teenagers, who have to warm themselves only with their body temperatures.

"It would have been a good idea to develop additional boarding schools in mountainous rural western regions to expand education opportunities for more children," she said.

"But how can children study well in such shabby conditions?"

Bad surroundings have threatened not only the health of rural students but the quality of their education by driving away a multitude of qualified teachers.

The county-level Dazhuang Junior High School used to have 92 teachers, 40 per cent of whom had only the lowest of qualification levels.

Yet 23 teachers, forming the backbone of the school, left in 2003.

The vacancies were later filled by substitutes, eight of whom have no teacher's school education.

"Though the total number has not changed, the entire quality of education there has decreased," Cheng noted.

And she said the poor western region tends to hold the wallet tight to schools which claim to have realized compulsory education, let alone the vast number of schools in more than 300 counties where compulsory education is still out of the question.

Yang Jin argued that even though the population of the counties that have fulfilled compulsory education accounts for 93.6 per cent of the total in China, there are still a considerable number of students who are not able to go school.

Yang said the ministry is placing greater importance to the balanced development of fundamental education this year, giving high priority to poor schools in rural areas.

"Principles about distribution of educational funds are expected to be written into the new law on compulsory education," he said.

Editor: Catherine