Security guard turned educator shows anything is possible

Zhang has the habit of keeping a diary. [Photo/Beijing News]

Moved by the good intentions of the teacher, Zhang started attending English class. He shuttled between the classroom and the sentry box every day. He left his post 10 minutes earlier than scheduled to change the uniform as he "felt a bit inferior wearing the security guard uniform in the classroom."

In the autumn of 1995, Zhang attended the national college entrance examination for adults and was enrolled in the law department of Peking University.

As a security guard-turned college student, Zhang shot to fame in the school and was invited to lecture other students.

Zhang said over the past two decades, he has kept doing two things: keeping a diary and getting up early in the morning.

He said he keeps a diary and reading notes, habits he developed as a university student. Even after rising to school headmaster, Zhang gets up at about 6 am everyday to go to the school's playground.

Zhang's story has inspired more people to change their lives. According to media reports, more than 500 security guards at Peking University alone had passed the test of the national college entrance examination for adults, with some even obtaining master's degrees.

After graduating from the university in 1998, Zhang returned to his hometown and worked at several vocational schools, before he establishing a secondary vocational school in 2015 along with four friends.

Zhang goes to the playground at 6 am every day to supervise the exercise of students. [Photo/Beijing News]

Zhang introduced a military-style management in the school because many of the students used to be poor in academic study and indulged in bad habits such as smoking, drinking and fighting. The system is designed to correct their bad behaviors.

Speaking about his reasons for working in vocational education, Zhang said: "At 15 or 16, kids who graduate from junior middle school are too young to enter society and should continue their study. With their mental conditions not yet shaped, they are prone to bad habits."

He intends to build his vocational school into an exemplary one in the city in the short term, and also aims to build the first privately-run university in Changzhi within a decade.