• China is the latest country to join the International Organization for Migration.

China is the latest country to join the International Organization for Migration. (Photo : Reuters)

The Ministry of Education (MOE) released data from last year on Friday, stating that educational facilities in underdeveloped areas were bolstered by financial resources worth 50 billion yuan ($8.15 billion) over the course of 2014.

The announcement was released during the same week that President Xi Jinping committed to the development of struggling ethnic countryside regions.

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According to Minister of Education Yuan Guiren, digital devices have been disseminated to 64,000 schools throughout China's remote rural areas, attended by over four million primary and middle-school students.

Benefits were also documented for rural teachers, who received increased subsidies, while professional development activities were delivered to 2.4 million teachers in kindergartens as well as primary and middle schools.

After the Economist's report in Aug. 2014, in which the publication spoke to a rural teenager who had dropped out of upper-secondary school, this week's news is an indication of the progress being made by the government in rural areas. The August piece cited demoralizing data that showed that only 7 percent of rural students entered middle school in 1990, while a study of rural students in four provinces found dropout rates of more than one-sixth to nearly a third.

However, more work is required and Yuan acknowledged this on Friday. He said that the promotion of fairness in education is ongoing, while the gap between rural and urban education needs to be reduced, and the dropout rate in compulsory education is still too high.

Safety and resources were also highlighted on Friday. An MOE report shows that insufficient funds, inefficient heating and inadequate safety measures remained problems during the winter period for students in provinces in the north of the country.

The report's contents are based on a Dec. 2014 inspection tour, whereby ministry teams visited 95 schools in eight provinces, the majority of which are located in remote areas. Given the findings of the report, the MOE made a commitment to address all of the shortcomings that continue to exist for rural students.