Xing Tan String Song

In the 1980s and 1990s, an important youth group was called "middle school teachers and students", numbering in the millions. They are scattered across the land of the motherland like sparks, working silently, inheriting civilization, and with their tenacity and dedication, they have jointly painted a long scroll of an era full of hope for the future of the country. Due to national strategic needs and in order to quickly fill the teacher gap in millions of villages, the state has recruited a large number of "primary and middle school teachers and students" from among the top junior high school graduates through strict selection. Most of this group of about 5 million young people come from poor families. They decided to give up college and stepped onto the three-foot podium at the age of 17 or 18. From noisy small towns to the most remote mountain village primary schools, they often take on multiple courses each. Under conditions of material scarcity and simple school buildings, they use their solid knowledge and youth to support "half the sky" of China's basic education, especially rural education. According to statistics, they constituted more than 75% of the teachers in rural primary schools at that time and taught more than 80% of the main courses. For decades, many people have dedicated their entire careers to a school and a local area, quietly cultivating generations of students and greatly promoting the popularization and fairness of compulsory education. However, their own personal development bottlenecks are limited due to their limited academic qualifications. They are the true cornerstones in the history of education in the Republic. Their collective dedication has illuminated the future of countless rural children, but they have silently engraved their youth on the sky of rural education in the Republic. This unique experience intertwined with youthful passion, confusion and tenacity has become a profound collective memory of a generation in the history of the Republic.