Sangye Tsewang: walk out of "secret lotus" [Photo/China Tibet Online]

Sangye Tsewang is from a farmer's family in Tibet's Medog County, which means "secret lotus" in Tibetan language.

After finishing primary education in the hometown, Sangye Tsewang was admitted to Nanhai Art Middle School in Foshan city of Guangdong Province and started his education in inland big cities.

In 2008, he was enrolled at Beijing Tibet Middle School and finished his three-year high school education there.

Now he is a senior student at Shandong University, studying in School of History and Culture.

"It has changed my life! If I hadn’t studied in inland cities, it would have been scarcely possible for me to walk out of Medog. Studying in inland classes has broadened my horizon and enriched my life. But Tibet is my home. After graduation, I will go back and work on the protection of traditional Tibetan culture," Sangye Tsewang said.

Since 1985, China has started to send Tibetan students to study at high schools in inland cities, in the hope of training more professionals for the underdeveloped plateau region and subsequently boosting Tibet's development.

Now inland Tibetan class has played a very important role in the education of Tibetan students.

According to the white paper on the Development and Progress of Tibet issued in 2013, in China 26 senior and junior middle schools in 20 provinces and municipalities directly under the Central Government have classes specially for Tibetan students; 60 key senior middle schools enroll students with registered permanent residence in Tibet; 48 state-level demonstration secondary vocational technical schools and 170 institutions of higher learning enroll students from the Tibetan classes.

These schools and universities have accumulatively enrolled 42,040 junior middle school students, 47,492 senior middle school students (secondary vocational school students), and 16,100 undergraduate students. Currently, inland Tibetan classes have 42,460 students.

There is no doubt that inland class has become an important supplement to the education of Tibetan students.