Your empathy is deeply appreciated. Chinese farmers are satisifed with their living condition, but they hope their children can lead better lives than themselves, and they know the power of education can change their children’s destinies. So they work harder to pay their children’s tuition fee. But they didn’t imagine their good intent could result in tragedies as mentioned in this article…

Thanks for partaking in this discussion. As you might have already noticed these farmers couldn’t support their family by farming in their own land so they decided to move to work in cities, in the hope that they may earn bigger money. But the reality often turns out disappointing. In other words, these poor farmers would rather try their luck in cities than be stuck in their farmland by generations.

For their left-behind children, they will try virtually anything to earn pocket money and fulfill their appetite. If they were with their parents and under appropriate supervision, this tragedy would not have happened. It was the Kukou system that cruelly separates parents from taking care of their children.

Thanks for partaking in this discussion. What you mentioned also worry Chinese too. As you saw from the post, the problems were deeply rooted and unless we have a thorough political upheaval, we can’t have real reforms on either the educational system or the household registration system. The education resources are unfaily allocated and due to house registraiton system, farms are farmers and citizens are citizens, and farmers are pratically discriminated by urban citizens. So when these farmers go to seek a living in cities and bring their kids with them, their kids can’t be fairly treated in city schools as their city peers. They have to leave their children behind.