Officials are seeking to raise more than 200 million yuan ($29 million) for the rebuilding of Beichuan Middle School, which was destroyed in the May 12 earthquake.
"With the help of Chinese people around the globe, we hope the new school will become a landmark of reconstruction," Yin Yuanyuan, an official with the All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese (AFROC), said yesterday.
"Just like the National Aquatics Center has become a landmark of overseas Chinese's contributions to the Beijing Olympic Games," he said.
During the earthquake, more than 800 students and teachers out of a total of 2,900 in the school died.
The AFROC began to raise funds for the school in August.
Li Xueyi, office director of the school, told China Daily that since the reconstruction cost of Sichuan is huge, donation from overseas Chinese and foreigners can play a key role to speed up the process.
Vice-Premier Li Keqiang said in Chengdu on Monday that the government will spend 1 trillion yuan on the reconstruction effort.
Earlier reports said the total cost is estimated to be 1.6 trillion yuan.
The school is planned to open in September 2010, and is expected to have 5,000 students.
The temporary school, which opened in last month, is located in Mianyang, Sichuan, and has 3,000 students.
The new school will cover an area of 133,000 sq m, twice the size of the previous one.
Li said the temporary school will be used for two years, before the new school is opened in the town of Anchang, where the new Beichuan county seat will be located.
A building design team made up of architects from Harvard University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Hong Kong University, Tsinghua University in Beijing and Tongji University in Shanghai arrived at Beichuan yesterday, Li said.
The team will survey the school's original and the new sites today, he said.
"The team will submit an architectural design proposal by next year," Zhou Rong, a professor of architecture at Tsinghua University, said.
The new school will consist of several modern but modest buildings, bearing the characteristics of the local Qiang people, Zhou said.
As the first donor, Yihai Property Holdings Ltd in Beijing has contributed 2 million yuan toward the design work.
Source: China Daily
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