Education plays an essential role in poverty alleviation and rural vitalization, and offers great opportunities to color up one's life, Kong Qingju, deputy head of the Teaching and Research Office at the Education Bureau of Menyuan Hui Autonomous County, northwest China's Qinghai Province, told the media on Friday at the Deputies' Corridor at this year's Two Sessions.

Kong was among the National People's Congress (NPC) deputies who met the press and took questions at the Deputies' Corridor before the opening of the fourth annual session of the 13th NPC at the Great Hall of the People on Friday in Beijing.

The Tibetan teacher shared a story about one of her students from a family in extreme poverty, whose life has been totally changed with the aid of local educational authorities and non-profit organizations.

"To relieve students of their concerns [of studying], the burden on their families has to be alleviated first," she said.

According to Kong, the local government in Menyuan Hui Autonomous County has helped a total of 125 poverty-stricken students who were forced to drop out due to poverty return to school since 2018, and 2,292 people in the county found jobs and have engaged in property management and agricultural operations.

More than 700 students from families in extreme poverty have left remote mountains to study and further broaden their horizons at prestigious universities across China such as Tsinghua University, thus changing the lives of themselves and their families.

Many of them returned to their hometown to work and start businesses after graduation, helping build a better village, Kong noted. 

"Recent years have witnessed dramatic changes in our hometown," she said. "New schools are the most beautiful scenery in our village."