DUJIANGYAN -- When she arrived in the Wanchuan (meaning "Anhui-Sichuan") School in this western city in Sichuan province at 7:30 am yesterday, Liang Yongmei, a 36-year-old teacher of Chinese, found several of her 31 students in Class 1, Grade 5, had been there although the first class would start at 9:20 am.
Students salute the national flag in the Wanchuan School in Dujiangyan, Sichuan province, on Monday morning. It is the first time the national flag is raised in any school in the city after the May 12 earthquake. [China Daily/Huang Zhiling] |
"Today is their first day to attend school after the May 12 earthquake. Students are excited and want to interact with each other," Liang said.
Yesterday marked the resumption of classes for 60,000 primary and high school students in Dujiangyan with the opening of 45 makeshift schools set up with prefabricated materials.
The earthquake turned 80 per cent of the schools in the city into dangerous buildings and more than 70,000 students from 92 schools had to drop out temporarily. On May 15, the Haihong Primary School was the first in the city to resume classes in tent.
