Vorisek started raising funds and applying for grants to support the Dandelion Project, an organization started by Sara Randt, wife of former American ambassador to China, Sandy Randt. This body is broadly concerned with people's welfare, encompassing programs for Tibetan midwives and Sichuan earthquake-related projects. Vorisek is focused on broader needs too, but migrant-specific ones; for instance, they have higher disease and lower nutrition rates than the rest of China's population. In Zheng Hong, a Harvard graduate in public administration and a China returnee, Vorisek met someone she could admire and support – in ways not incongruent with her banking career. "In banking, my area was always the people – the customers, the staff, " and she notes, "Every country went through big changes in education; China has its own." Vorisek is a bit like the Thousand Hands Buddha; about her executive search activities her take on it is "China's growth needs talent, and a healthy mix of it."

China has the world's largest university enrollment on record. A literate, well-trained labor force helped transform Japan and South Korea; all Asian governments understand that access to higher education is a prerequisite to sustained economic growth. By 2006 China was spending 1.5 percent of its GDP on higher education, nearly triple what it was spending a decade earlier. Enrollments between 1997 and 2007 quintupled, a staggering, unprecedented leap. Any sub-population of significant size failing to get a decent education is a serious loss to China's future assets.

If the government is serious about fostering creativity in China, migrant youths are an indispensable force.

Dandelion has and does what it can to improve access for its 685 enrolled students (508 of whom are boarders): a sliding scale for annual tuition tops at RMB1,360 (USD 200) with additional fees for room and board. Depending on the family's circumstances, Zheng's school can, and does, waive any of these fees. Vorisek's fundraising puts value-added projects in the mix, like the annual Music and Lyrics Dinner and a capacity building summer project involving eight Duke University students as part of the Duke Engage series.

The government has noticed what Dandelion is doing with minimal resources and a largely migrant staff. Zheng offers migrants more options than vocational schools. In its first year of operation (2006), only 60 percent graduated from the grade 9 program with marks good enough to pass into 10th grade. Now, 90 percent make it. Despite low teacher salaries it encourages professional development and fosters an overall can-do atmosphere. But more important, "The teachers live in deep companionship with the students, because empathy creates a sense of belonging – that this is an extended family," Zheng Hong smiles.

Quick to reward initiative, government commitments have been made to help with student fees (RMB 130 per student), complete safety upgrades, and control traffic at peak hours near the school entrance. Fund-raising for a new, safe campus on purchased or donated land is ongoing. Zheng and Vorisek are imagining what results they'll see when they reach their goals: establishing self-funding systems with their Dandelion Social Enterprises project and a managed education fund in the school's name.

Dandelion embodies improved access to education, but changing the style of teaching may prove much more difficult in China. Both kinds of change need to reach deep down into high school, middle school and even elementary educational institutions. Building world-class universities with top research facilities requires multidisciplinary breadth, independent thought and critical thinking skills – needs underserved by Chinese public education.

Widespread English competence is another brick in China's development bridge, and the task is as enormous as the business opportunity. John Kung's family moved to Vancouver from Hong Kong when he was a boy. He returned to China to find a commercial niche in 2002, and in 2004 started a British Columbia high school program for Chinese nationals based in Qingdao. But struggling with a curriculum delivered entirely in English, few Chinese students actually graduated in 2007. Kung still follows his first cohort's progress in Canada, but concluded about an education delivered entirely in English – the earlier the better. On that note, he switched his resources to establishing a kindergarten in Beijing, based in an apartment. Today his complex of kindergartens, under the name Muffy's Place, are thriving throughout Haidian District with 159 kindergarten students enrolled and 220 "graduates" in the after-school program.

"It just felt right. Next thing you know, we had a waiting list," he grins. Having no education degree himself, he relies heavily on the credentials and professionalism of his American, Canadian and Australian teachers, and the recruiting skills of family friends – educational professionals – in Canada. It takes longer to make a profit running a kindergarten than people might believe, he confides. Muffy's has eight full-time teachers, a bus service and a bevy of administrative, cleaning and kitchen staff to support. Attractive and safe premises don't come cheap either.

Parents like the multi-dimensional aspect of Muffy's; the school ensures that other developmental activities like games, skating and track-and-field outings, a sports program, a choral group, and regular school plays, round out the English-learning environment. Kung is confident children get a full social program at his school, explaining, " Teachers also have a free hand in developing full academic programs for each age level."

Parents seemed to agree, and asked for more services; soon, an after-school program meant that Muffy's "graduates" become sea-turtles themselves, returning a couple of days a week and on weekends to keep their English language skills refreshed and expanding.

Kung was under no delusions about making a quick buck; he came here to make a life. When not overseeing Muffy's Place, he is captain of a local ex-pat hockey team, the Hot Wings. His rest and recreation is always overshadowed by promptings from parents to offer more, but he stops short of starting an international school; "Then you're playing with the big boys," he shrugs.