Zhang Guiwang (R) grades an assignment during the class break, while his student, Liu Lian, draws beside him. [Photo: Fujian Daily]

In a remote village in Huilong Township of Jianyang City, Fujian Province, stands a quiet, lonely primary school, Bantianxiao Primary School. Inside, a lone teacher gives lessons to a single student every day, Fujian Daily reports.

Zhang Guiwang, aged 55, is the only teacher in the school. In 2007, when he took up the teaching post in Bantianxiao Primary School, there were five students. Now, there is only one, named Liu Lian.

Bantianxiao Primary School used to be a complete elementary school with junior and senior sections, its students numbering more than 80 at its peak.

But now, more and more parents are leaving the village in search of jobs in cities, taking their children with them. Attendance declined to one student in 2009, and the school was reduced to a mere teaching site under the township primary school, the report says.

Plans to close the school and send its students to the township primary school were scrapped considering the 20-kilometer journey through the mountains the young students would have to make, said the township primary school principal who did not identify himself.

The school now provides courses up to the third year, when students are old enough to leave the village and attend the township primary school for more advanced courses.

Previously, teachers from the county school were teaching here in annual shifts, but Zhang chose to stay, saying he loved the students and wished to remain at the post until retiring.

Every week, he travels the bumpy road on a motorcycle. He is content with the 100-yuan gas subsidy from the county primary school.

In his room stands a big board listing the content and progress of all subjects for students up to third year.

In less than a month, when the city authority tests the quality of primary school teaching, Zhang is confident his only student will score handsome marks.

Today in China, most schools in remote villages are witnessing a shrinking of their attendance, as countless migrant workers in search of a livelihood are pouring out of their hometowns with their children in tow.