Karma Ngawang 
Credit: AI
On June 24, 2026, after seventeen years of operation, the Hungkar Dorje Vocational High School permanently closed its doors. Located near the Lung-ngon Monastery in the Golog (Gulou) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of present-day Qinghai Province, the academy also known as the Snowland Ancient and Modern Education Centre was far more than a local school. It was a thriving sanctuary for Tibetan heritage. Its forced shutdown represents not just the end of a single beloved institution, but the culmination of a systematic campaign by the Chinese government to dismantle Tibetan-medium education and forcibly assimilate a generation of youth
Since opening in 2008 with full governmental approval, the academy served over a thousand students from nomadic and rural communities. Founded by the revered philanthropic lama Tulku Hungkar Dorje, the school offered free education deeply rooted in the Tibetan language, alongside English, Chinese and specialized vocational training in traditional medicine, weaving, Thangka painting and information technology. For the founder, the school was a deeply personal mission. He once described it as being born from “pure intention, hard work, perseverance” and the “very bone and marrow of my love for my people.” Yet, it was exactly this unwavering devotion to his people’s culture that sealed the institution’s fate.
The school’s closure stems directly from two intersecting mandates of Beijing’s escalating assimilation policies: language replacement and ideological control. Roughly two years ago, Chinese authorities issued an ultimatum, demanding the school incorporate Chinese Communist Party-political ideology into its curriculum and transition to Mandarin-only instruction. This mandate struck at the core of the school’s mission to preserve the Tibetan mother tongue. When Tulku Hungkar Dorje refused to compromise, officials barred the academy from admitting new students. Through personal petitions, the founder managed to negotiate a brief grace period, keeping the doors open just long enough for the final cohort of thirty students to graduate before authorities mandated the permanent shutdown.
This bureaucratic strangulation is shadowed by a much darker, tragic reality regarding the founder himself. Facing intense persecution for his educational and cultural advocacy, Tulku Hungkar Dorje fled to Vietnam. In March 2025, after being missing for over eight months, he died under highly suspicious circumstances while in the custody of Chinese and Vietnamese authorities. Human rights groups have condemned his death as a severe case of transnational repression. Following his death, Beijing aggressively tightened its grip on his home region. Monks who travelled to Vietnam to retrieve his body were restricted to viewing only his face, while back in Tibet, officials placed his monastery under round-the-clock surveillance, searched locals’ phones and detained Tibetans who dared to express condolences online. His other educational initiatives were swiftly shuttered shortly after his disappearance, leaving the high school as the last surviving remnant of his life’s work.
The tragedy of the Hungkar Dorje school is not an isolated incident; it is part of a meticulously executed blueprint. Since 2021, authorities have aggressively targeted private and monastic schools across the Golog region. Prominent institutions with decades of excellence, such as the Sengdrug Tagtse network and the Ragya Gangjong Sherig Norbuling School, have all been forcibly dismantled. Today, the Chinese government insists that all Tibetan children attend state-run schools where Mandarin is the sole medium of instruction from primary school onward. In these state facilities, Tibetan is reduced to a foreign language elective if taught at all while students are subjected to heavy political indoctrination and increasingly, military-style training. This forced assimilation blatantly contradicts both the Chinese Constitution and international human rights covenants guaranteeing the right to mother-tongue education, while advocates who push back like Tashi Wangchuk and others face severe prison sentences or death in custody.
This cultural erasure is driven from the highest levels of government. President Xi Jinping has personally championed the push to forge a “strong sense of community for the Chinese nation,” aggressively promoting Mandarin in border regions to dissolve ethnic distinctions. The June closure perfectly aligns with the implementation of China’s new Law on Promoting Ethnic Unity and Progress, which took effect on 01 July 2026. This sweeping legislation nationally formalizes the mandate for Mandarin instruction and legally bans parents and institutions from teaching ideas deemed detrimental to “ethnic unity.” What had been an ad hoc regional crackdown on Tibetan language schools over the past five years now possesses an ironclad, national legal framework.
In the wake of the school’s closure, a quiet wave of grief swept through the Tibetan community. Despite intense censorship and the risk of detention, countless alumni and students changed their social media profile backgrounds to images of the academy and their late founder. Circulating messages praised the lama for dedicating his entire life to his people. While the Chinese government has successfully closed the physical doors of Golog’s last independent Tibetan schools and codified its assimilation efforts into national law, the persistent online tributes reveal a culture that refuses to be quietly erased. The classrooms may be empty, but the profound legacy of Tulku Hungkar Dorje and his academy remains firmly etched into the minds of the thousands of students they empowered.
About the Author
Jun Hao 
Rinchen Tashi 
