China's Xinjiang attaches great importance to education, said Elijan Anayit, a spokesperson from the information office of the local government, at a press conference on Monday.
The gross enrollment rate of pre-school education is 95.95 percent, and 99.9 percent of school-age children are enrolled in primary schools, the spokesperson noted.
The region has realized full coverage of nine-year compulsory education around the region and the four prefectures in southern Xinjiang provide a 15-year free education to all children from kindergarten to senior middle school, he added.
Xinjiang has built more than 12,000 schools to meet this demand, according to Elijan Anayit.
The autonomous region spent 86.1 billion yuan on education in 2019, he said.
About 12.94 percent of students in primary school and 44.68 percent in middle school are enrolled in boarding schools.
The local government has fully carried out education using the standard spoken and written Chinese language, Elijan Anayit said.
He also stressed that the students' right to learn and use their mother tongue and written system is fully protected.
The curriculum design and examinations of primary and middle schools have included subjects of ethnic minority languages, and schools are encouraged to organize traditional cultural activities of ethnic minorities.
All these have effectively promoted the inheritance and development of ethnic minority languages and cultures, said the spokesperson.
