64-year-old Zhang Guimei is a teacher. She has spent about 40 years helping young girls from poor families in Yunnan to receive a higher education. Her school, Huaping Girls High School in Lijiang City, is the first full-tuition free(学费全免的) high school for girls from poor families in China.
Zhang moved to Lijiang at the age of 17 to teach in the middle school in Huaping County. Once, she got badly ill but had no money for the treatment(治疗). With the help of the people there, she was able to get the necessary treatment. "From then on, I told myself that I must do something for those people who helped me," Zhang said.
Slowly, a dream of setting up a free high school for girls in Huaping County emerged in Zhang's heart. From the year of 2002, she began a six-year journey to look for funds(资金). In 2008, Zhang finally set up Huaping Girls High School at the foot of the Shizi Mountain in Huaping.
Until now, Zhang's school has sent more than1,600 girls to universities. "I'm very thankful to her. She made us girls from poor areas able to go and see the world outside, "said Yang Qian, a graduate(毕业生) from Zhang's school.
Zhang's story moves many people. To help her, the Yunnan Normal University planned to send 46 future graduates as teachers each year to her school.
