The new semester beginning this week brings more joy to many migrant workers and their children in Shanghai as local authorities have officially listed their schools as private-run educational institutions.

With this official sanction, government funds will for the first time arrive at these schools to upgrade facilities and subsidize each student enrolled. In the Pudong New Area, an average of 500,000 yuan ($88,230) is earmarked for each school's facelift.

To people like Sun Jianhong, headmaster of Pudong's Tangsi Primary School, the legal protection now for the school is a spiritual support. It means much more than just money, although those poor parents now no longer have to pay 550 yuan for books and tuition each semester.