In Depth: How China’s Migrant Students End Up Locked Out of Local High School

Ninth-grader Liu Yu is facing a future-defining decision.

Liu, now attending a school for migrant children on Beijing’s urban fringes, lacks Beijing household registration, leaving her with only one education path in the capital: vocational school. If she wants to attend a regular high school to prepare for university, she must leave the only home she has ever known.