A brief ceremony was held in Chengdu city, Sichuan province, on Friday afternoon to offer scholarship to the children of medical workers.
A total of 102 children whose parents are medical workers each received a scholarship of 10,000 yuan ($1,492).
The funds are from the "Successors to Angels" Blue Sword Scholarship, which was initiated by the Sichuan Provincial Committee of the Communist Youth League and the Sichuan Lanjian Beverage Group Co Ltd on July 22 and is managed by Sichuan Youth Development Foundation.
The scholarship will be granted for seven consecutive years. Each year, 100 children whose parents are medical workers and who are university freshmen with the medical major will each receive 10,000 yuan.
The scholarship is aimed at raising public awareness of respecting medical workers and helping win the fight against COVID-19, said Wang Bin, general manager of the Sichuan Lanjian Beverage Group Co Ltd.
Over 300 university freshmen who are medical majors have applied for this year’s scholarship. Those with the highest scores in the national university entrance examination, or gaokao, held in July, have won the scholarship, according to Ouyang Dandan, an executive with the beverage group.
Speaking on behalf of the 102 scholarship winners, Liu Nian, a freshwoman from the West China School of Stomatology, Sichuan University, said her father, a doctor with the department of rehabilitation in a Sichuan hospital, moved her deeply and prompted her to become a doctor like him.
When Liu, a native of Meishan in Sichuan, was busy preparing for the gaokao at home, her father was dispatched to the isolation observation area for suspected cases of COVID-19 where he took temperature twice a day and disinfected the area.
"Dad said he wanted to be with me at home. But for the happiness and safety of others, he had to leave for the isolation observation area," Liu said.
Duan Hongyu, an associate professor with West China Second University Hospital, Sichuan University, shared his experience as a member of the Sichuan medical team aiding Hubei province from February 13 to March 20 during the coronavirus pandemic with the scholarship winners, encouraging them to study for public good.