Best and brightest: Teachers who inspire the nation

Man quits well-paid job to teach in village

Yang Ming came to Wachang elementary school in Qianxi county, Southwest China's Guizhou province in 2009 as a 25-year-old volunteer teacher and never left.

He said his dream was to teach in impoverished regions when he was young, so he quit his well-paid job in exports and joined a volunteer teaching team.

Although he had prepared himself for poor conditions, he was still shocked by the school — a two-story cement building. Teachers rang a bell to start classes, while students had few things to play with.

During the first year, there was no broadband. Yang spent his days preparing for class, reading, visiting students and playing with them. He showed them cellphones, notebooks, books and introduced the outside world to them.

When his volunteer time was over, he was moved by his students' tears and chose to stay.

In his 11 years of teaching in Guizhou, he has spent 80,000 yuan of his salary supporting more than 100 impoverished students. He also contacted public interest organizations and companies and received donations worth one million yuan.

Yang said he felt fulfilled and satisfied.