Translated By TenGyal
A large number of students from two of the largest schools in Tibet’s nomadic regions have been enrolled in urban colonial-style boarding schools.
Following a 7.0 magnitude earthquake on October 22, 1,498 students from the nomadic region of Drachen (Bachen) County in Nagchu, Tibet, were relocated to Lhasa between November 1 and 3. At the same time, thousands of students from Golog Prefecture were also enrolled into newly built boarding middle schools in Xining and Ledu (乐都), hundreds of kilometres away from their homelands.
According to reports from Chinese state media channels, among those students moved from Nagchu, 943 were from Maru Township and 555 from Gangchen Township, who were divided into three groups and transported to Lhasa. On November 1, 589 students in the fifth and sixth elementary grades were transported and arrived in Lhasa that evening. On November 2, 497 students were sent, followed on November 3 by 356 first- and second-graders along with 68 teachers. In addition, even infant first-grade primary school children were separated from their parents and made to board at a secondary school.
On November 4, classes commenced for 1,584 teachers and students at Lhasa Nagchu Complete Middle School (拉萨市那曲完全中学). The school’s inaugural activity was an ideological and political education session centred on the main themes of “Expressing Gratitude to the Party” and “Forging a Strong Sense of Community for the Chinese Nation.”The program began at 10:20 a.m. with the raising of the Chinese national flag and the singing of the national anthem.
Photo from the Internet
During the program, Gakya Kyab, a student in the third section of the sixth grade at Gangchen Township Primary School, was called upon to deliver a speech, stating: “Having arrived here after going through many difficulties, we are never fighting alone. Under the love and care of the Party and the state, and with the support of all sectors of society, we can study with peace of mind. That warmth, transcending mountains and coming from diverse places and ethnic groups, has given us a profound sense that the Chinese people share one common home.”
Lhasa Nagchu Complete Middle School (formerly Tibet Complete Middle School) is located in Village No. 5 of Tsalna Township, Chushur (Chushul) County, Lhasa City, roughly 24 kilometres from Lhasa. Covering an area of 160,000 square meters, the school houses both junior and senior middle school divisions. Construction was completed in April of this year, followed by student recruitment from June through September, and the school officially opened on October 13. In its initial intake, 1,200 new students and 107 staff members were enrolled, with future plans to admit 1,800 students each for the junior and senior middle school divisions, reaching a total capacity of 3,600.
Students From Golog Transferred to Xining and Ledu
Golog Xining Nationalities Middle School (果洛西宁民族中学), a boarding school situated in northern Xining City, Qinghai Province, currently has 2,930 students from the Golog region. These students are required to go to study at a distance of over 500 to 600 kilometres from their homelands. The school is part of an educational assistance project initiated by Shanghai Municipality to Golog in 2010. In 2017, Shanghai and Qinghai jointly invested 1.45 billion yuan into its creation, completing construction in July 2019. The school features 18 classes across six grades of junior and senior middle school, enrolling students from Golog’s six counties. Among them, 70 per cent come from nomadic areas at altitudes above 4,200 meters, and 98 per cent are Tibetans.
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In its promotion of the school, the Chinese authorities stated that the school is “a new path to provide high-quality education to students in high-altitude regions” and ” theresolution of the problem of unbalanced local education development,” while actively promoting slogans instructing students to“express gratitude to the Party, listen to the Party, and follow the Party.”
Similarly, Golog Haidong (tib. Tsoshar) Middle School (果洛海东中学)—where construction began in May 2024, and classes opened on September 1 of this year—is located in Ledu District, Haidong (tib. Tsoshar), about 65 kilometres from Xining. Covering an area of 134,700 square meters, the school currently has 1,200 students enrolled across 10 first-year junior middle school classes and 14 first-year senior middle school classes, with an overall planned capacity of 1,200 junior middle school students and 1,800 senior middle school students.
Photo From the Internet
The Chinese Government’s Explanation and Criticisms
The Chinese government explained that it relocated Nagchu students to Lhasa because earthquake damage to pastoral schools made constructing new classrooms immediately impossible. Concerning Golog, state media outlets mainly cited poor local infrastructure and lagging education, highlighting that nomadic children had to be transported for hours on motorcycles by family members, suffered frozen hands and feet during winter, and lacked vegetables at home—where food was limited to meat, butter, cheese, tsampa, and momos—whereas city schools provide diverse vegetables every day and pay monthly cash allowances.
However, Tibetan education researchers and several human rights organisations have repeatedly asserted that using poor local infrastructure and lagging education as a pretext to separate young pastoral children from their parents, language, and culture by enrolling them in urban boarding schools is a policy of Sinicisation. In 2023, several United Nations human rights experts likewise voiced deep concern that roughly one million Tibetan children were in residential schools, posing a severe risk of cultural and linguistic assimilation into the Han Chinese majority.
Chinese state media have offered no clarification whatsoever on whether the Nagchu students will return to their hometowns once their local schools are rebuilt.
