BEIJING -- President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, has extended greetings to teachers and educators across the country ahead of Teachers' Day, which falls on Wednesday.

In a letter to eight rural teachers, Xi urged them to enhance their teaching skills and nurture more capable young people with sound moral grounding, intellectual ability, physical vigor, aesthetic sensibility, and work skills needed to join and carry on the socialist cause.

The letter was sent in response to the eight representatives from the Special-Post Teachers Program, a central government-funded initiative that has sent about 1.18 million college graduates to teach in rural areas of central and western China since 2006. The program has covered over 30,000 schools, spanning more than 1,000 counties in 22 provincial-level regions.

Over the past two decades since its implementation, teachers in the program have demonstrated the dedication and sense of responsibility emblematic of people's teachers, Xi noted in the letter.

He called on them to continue upholding their original aspiration in education and guide children toward healthy growth.

In an instruction on the program, Premier Li Qiang, also a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, called on teachers and educators to work where the motherland and the people need them the most, and to contribute more to building a strong educational system.