China's State Council approved in principle measures for granting free education to students training to become teachers at an executive meeting on Wednesday.

The measures, which are on a trial basis, cover students majoring in education in six normal universities directly under the Ministry of Education.

At the meeting, chaired by Premier Wen Jiabao, the council also approved in principle guidelines on establishing a system to provide financial aid to regular college students and vocational school students from poor households.

The measures and guidelines will be promulgated for implementation after receiving further revisions, according to the meeting.

Reporting work of the government to the National People's Congress in March, Wen said the government is adopting two major measures to promote development of education and fairness in education.  

He said a system of national scholarships and tuition assistance will go into operation this school year for regular undergraduate institutions, vocational colleges and secondary vocational schools. 

In addition, the government will also further implement the state student loan policy to enable children from families with financial difficulties to attend college or receive vocational education.  

He called this as another major move to promote fairness in education following the exemption of all tuition and miscellaneous fees for rural compulsory education students.  

Wen also said the government will institute free education for students majoring in education in teacher colleges directly under the Ministry of Education and set up a corresponding system. 

"This measure is designed to demonstrate to the general public the importance of the teaching field, to create an atmosphere of respect for teachers and education in society, to increase awareness of the value of the education profession throughout society, to produce large numbers of outstanding teachers, and to encourage prominent educators to run schools and more outstanding young people to become lifelong educators," said Wen.

Chinese educators said after experiment in the six universities, the government is expected to apply the measure in other normal universities.

(Xinhua News Agency May 10, 2007)