Prioritizing education leads to high marks for city

Anning in Yunnan province has made remarkable efforts to promote the modernization and high-quality development of its education, said local officials.

Since 2005, Anning has embarked on school employment projects, such as Teacher Selection Management Measures and Work Plan for Hiring Outstanding Retired Teachers, to attract excellent faculties to work in urban and rural schools.

The construction of talented teams and high-quality teaching standards have laid a solid foundation for a booming regional education in the long run.

In 1995, there was one kindergarten, one urban elementary school and two urban high schools in the region. Now, it has 89 schools at all levels with more than 5,200 teachers and some 61,200 students.

The city is home to one national-level vocational high school, seven provincial-level schools, six modern education demonstration schools, one provincial modern education demonstration kindergarten, 21 green schools and one national civilized school.

Anning was rated as an advanced city in education in the province in 2009 and 2018.

In 2017, it was rated as a national advanced city in minor ideological and moral construction.

Anning Middle School is a typical example of the high-quality development of county schools in Yunnan.

After 15 years of development, it has formed a pattern of "one school and three districts"－the school headquarters, Songhua campus and Taiping school covering elementary, middle and high schooling.

"Culture is the core competitiveness of a school's sustainable development," said He Ming, head of Anning Middle School.

He said building a team of teachers with dedication, love for children and the pursuit of excellence has been key to the school's development.

Anning Middle School has won many national and provincial prizes in teaching skills competitions.

He said a high-quality school should adhere to the concept of "all for the development of every student".

The school has formed an all-round cooperative and exchange relationship with domestic schools.

More than 10 first-rate universities－including Nankai University, Tianjin University, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Harbin Institute of Technology, China Agricultural University and Shandong University－have signed contracts with Anning Middle School to build quality student bases.

It has also maintained various forms of exchanges with international educational institutions in such countries as the United States, Sweden, Singapore, New Zealand, Japan and Thailand to carry out civic education for exchange programs, including social practices and projects in environmental protection and culture.

To highlight the core concept of "all for the development of every student", the school focuses on transforming methods of teaching and learning and strives to construct an open community for both teachers and students.

The school also implements the "human-oriented education" strategy, pays great attention to quality of life of teachers and students and embodies routine management, quality and moral education.

"Igniting dreams is the prerequisite for effective teaching. Everyone has the fire of dreams in their hearts," He said.

The school has promoted all-round development of students and cultivated a group of clubs with distinctive characteristics, He said.

Among them, the student folk orchestra, established in 2008, has developed into a eye-catching feature of the school.

As the first demonstration orchestra for primary and secondary schools in Yunnan, the orchestra has used folk music to interpret the customs of ethnic minorities and regional culture as its development idea.

It has represented primary and secondary school students in Yunnan when participating in art festivals in Singapore, the United States, and France three times, and has performed in the Golden Hall of Vienna, Austria.

Also, the Songhua Campus Choir of Anning Middle School was invited to participate in the 2019 New Year special program of CCTV Children's Channel "The Voice of the Galaxy", singing classic Yunnan folk songs.

In the future, He said that Anning Middle School will play the leading role in high-quality educational resources and take root in the county to run broader education.