Liu Zhenhai, a white-collar professional from China's capital Beijing, is attending "Sishu", an old-style private school, in the central province of Hunan, to learn traditional Chinese culture.

Liu, 28, had been a teacher in his hometown Zhangjiakou city, Hebei Province, and an office administrator with a Beijing-based electric appliance company before he devoted himself to promoting traditional Chinese culture at "Yidan School", a non-government cultural organization based in Beijing.

He came to Pingjiang County in November, where the traditional tutorial system began to revive in the 1980s, to learn from Zhu Zhizhong, a reputed scholar who has been tutoring for over 50 years.

Zhu, more than 80 years old, said Liu was the best educated student he had ever taught, as most other students were migrant workers and had only finished junior high school.

Liu said he worked eight hours a day, reading classics, writing poems and couplets and learning to behave the way a well-educated person was supposed to behave in the old days.

"I've always dreamed of studying traditional Chinese culture systematically in an old-style school," he told Xinhua, "it will help establish a unique corporate image and culture in my own business, and improve the moral standards of my employees."

Liu said he would like to promote the centuries-old tutorial system in Beijing in the near future to carry forward the country' s long civilization.

His love for traditional culture was inherited from his father and grandfather, both intellectuals in his hometown.

China's private tutorial system dates back to the days of Confucius, a scholar and educator who lived 2,500 years ago. Sishu schools were popular throughout China's history, until 1949 when most private schools were absorbed by public schools after the People's Republic was founded.

But what these schools used to teach their students is still considered by many to be the essence of Chinese culture - classics that embody the wisdom of Chinese ancestors, as well as courtesy, writing and calligraphic skills that are essential to cultivating a whole and balanced man.

When sishu schools started to mushroom again in Pingjiang + a county with about one million population + in the mid 1980s, villages often each had as many as five of the traditional schools.

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