With dreams and ambitions as her only companions, Tsangyal, a native of Nyingchi prefecture in Tibet, left home and traveled thousands of kilometers to Beijing in September 2013 to become the first member of her family to study outside of the autonomous region.

A year later, the 17-year-old student remembered almost every detail of the first weeks in Beijing as if it were yesterday. "I cried almost every night. I missed my parents," she said, adding that the weather in Beijing was stiflingly hot and she caught colds easily.

But nothing was going to stop her from pursuing her dream to study in Beijing Tibet Middle School, one of 28 such schools set up in 21 provincial regions outside of the autonomous region.