0. Introduction
While China is making great strides toward achieving universal basic education, with a nearly universal net enrollment rate among primary schoolage children and a 00.0% promotion rate to junior secondary schools among primary school graduates (NBSC 0000), health problems among its rural students have emerged as a serious concern in the recent decade. Physical health problems, such as anemia and cardiometabolic risk, are found to be prevalent in rural schools in China. Risks of mental health problems, especially depression and anxiety, are also high among rural Chinese students. These health problems, no doubt, seriously undermine rural children’s current wellbeing. Worse yet, the important role child health plays in the formation of one’s human capital predicts that these health problems may substantially lower rural children’s future socio-economic
attainment when they become the backbone of China’s labor force.
Early discussions in China mostly revolved around physical health problems among rural Chinese students. Yet, triggered by a series of devastating suicide incidents that stemmed from mental health issues, increasing attention has been paid to rural students’ mental health problems.