Bijie Tongxin Agricultural and Industrial Secondary Vocational and Technical School

Guizhou Province in southwest China was a key battleground in poverty alleviation due to its large and widely dispersed impoverished population, as well as its extreme living conditions and lack of infrastructure. The low level of education was a crucial factor in the intergenerational transmission of poverty. This chapter focuses on the Bijie Tongxin Agricultural and Industrial Secondary Vocational and Technical School, which was established in 2010 as one of the initial targeted poverty alleviation educational projects in Guizhou. Despite facing challenges such as a widely dispersed ethnic minority population, general neglect of education, and issues related to children left behind, the school has achieved success through its educational efforts. The case study illustrates that the collaborative efforts of the school, government, and enterprises have increased local focus on education and provided students with improved employment opportunities. The effectiveness of this approach is further evidenced by similar cases overseas, such as in Nigeria, and by the success of the night school in Hainan that utilized television broadcasts to empower students.