Looking at the members discussing the issue, Li Tiezhu shouted, "Hold on, everyone. Listen to me. I know everyone feels that building a school is pointless. After all, there's no money for the children to go to school. But didn't I just say that building this school was the result of careful consideration by several of us team leaders?"

After a pause, he continued, "Besides, our brigade built the school ourselves, so how can we charge money? Therefore, all the children in our brigade don't have to pay for school!"

Li Dashu had long considered sending his children to school, but because he had too many children at home and couldn't afford it, he had given up. When he heard the captain's words, he exclaimed, "Captain, are you serious?"

Li Tiezhu: "It must be true."

Someone in the crowd asked, "What about the teacher? Where can we find a teacher?"

Li Tiezhu glanced at the educated youth in the crowd and said, "With so many educated youth in our brigade, are we still worried about not being able to find a teacher?"

When the educated youth heard that they could become teachers, they were all eager to try. Although it was only a primary school teacher, it was much better than working in the fields.

Li Qiang spoke first: "Captain, if I become a teacher, what will happen to my work points?"

"Don't worry about that. Every teacher gets full work points every day. Except for the winter and summer holidays and the busy farming season, they don't have to work in the fields to earn work points."

When they heard that they didn't have to go to the fields, the group of educated youth were ecstatic. You know, almost no one among them could get full work points, except Yang Qiangjun. But after all, he had been practicing since he was a child, and who else could compare with him? So this was a rare opportunity.

Li Tiezhu took a look and then said, "Of course, not every educated youth can become a teacher. There will definitely be an assessment when the time comes."

At this time, someone in the crowd asked again, "Captain, can't our members be teachers? We can't just rely on the educated youth!"

"That's right, if there's such a good thing, why are all the educated youth there?"

Li Tiezhu knew what they were thinking, so he said, "When did I ever say there was nothing for the members to do? Anyone can participate, but you have to have some knowledge. If you don't know anything, isn't it just a waste of energy?"

As soon as these words were spoken, a large group of members blushed with embarrassment, and the little plans in their minds had to be scrapped.

In this way, the decision to run a primary school in the Dongfeng Brigade was made, and soon the brigade leader Li Tiezhu arranged a dozen men to get to work in a hurry.

Most of the villagers had built their own houses before. The primary school of Dongfeng Brigade was completed in just two days. There were three classrooms in the whole school. Li Tiezhu thought that there were not many children in the brigade, so he built three classrooms first to test the waters, with two grades in each class. He would build more classrooms when there were more students.

The school was built, but since winter was approaching, it was temporarily put on hold. After all, most of the last semester had already passed, and it would be against the rules to reopen now.

As for the teacher assessment, Li Tiezhu specifically found Li Pinglin, who taught at the town's middle school, and asked him to help select the candidates, including the educated youth Zhao Xiuer, Li Qiang, and a girl from the Dongfeng Brigade, Li Yaner.

Originally, when the topic of selecting a teacher came up, Zhang Xiuzhi wanted to let Dani try as well. After all, this girl was already in junior high school, so there would be no problem for her to teach in elementary school. But perhaps Dani was not suitable to be a teacher, so she did not pass the assessment.

I originally wanted to go find the team leader Li Tiezhu, but Niu Cuihua found out and stopped me. After all, the matter has been exposed. If you try to make any more tricks, wouldn’t that be a slap in the face of the Li family?

Besides, Niu Cuihua thought that her granddaughter would also go to school here in the future. What if she couldn’t teach Dani well?

I have to say that Niu Cuihua is quite far-sighted. In the final exam, Li Mingxi scored 100 points in both subjects and took home a big certificate.

Although Niu Cuihua was illiterate, she was very happy when she saw the certificate brought back by her granddaughter. You know, in the whole family, no one had ever won two hundred points, except for the girl Li Taohua.

Niu Cuihua held the certificate in her hand, her face beaming with joy. "Xiaoxi, tell grandma what you want to eat and I'll make it for you."

Li Mingxi thought about it and realized that she really didn't want to eat anything. Just then, she saw Mingde next to her making gestures to her, so she said, "Grandma, I want to eat some fried candy cakes."

"Okay, since you want to eat this, I'll make it for you," Niu Cuihua put the certificate away and started making it.

First boil some hot water, then scoop out a small bowl of flour from the vat, stir while adding water, and when all the flour has turned into dough, start kneading the dough. First sprinkle some dry flour on the chopping board, put some oil on your hands, pour out the dough in the basin, and then start kneading the dough. After the surface of the dough is smooth, put it back into the kneading basin to let it rise.

Then I took some brown sugar from the cupboard, poured it into a bowl, added some flour and stirred it. After the dough had risen, I started to wrap it. After all the dough was wrapped, I put the raw dough into a warm pan with 50% oil and started frying it.

Before the sugar cake was ready, Li Mingxi and her siblings began to wait eagerly in the kitchen. After all, sugar cake was not often eaten at home, as it was greasy and sugary, and Niu Cuihua was reluctant to make it often. The reason she made it this time was entirely for the sake of her granddaughter, so Li Mingxi and her siblings ate it with great satisfaction.

That day, Niu Cuihua was making shoes for Li Mingxi while muttering, "Didn't your second aunt write to say they'd be back for the New Year this year? Why haven't they come back yet? Could something have happened?"

Li Mingxi: "Grandma, don't scare yourself. Maybe something has delayed you!"

"I hope so!"

As the two were talking, they heard someone outside shouting, "Aunt Cuihua, come out quickly, your second son is back."

When Niu Cuihua heard this, she immediately put down her needlework and ran out. Li Mingxi saw her grandmother's excited expression and knew that she hadn't seen her second uncle for several years. She could only run after her and shout, "Grandma, go slower! Don't fall."

As soon as the two of them walked to the gate, they saw a military green jeep coming towards their house and stopped directly at the door. Then, two men, one woman, and two little boys got out of the jeep.

Although Li Mingxi had only met her second uncle once, she still had an impression of him, so she recognized the older man as her second uncle at a glance.

When Niu Cuihua saw her son who she hadn't seen for several years come back, she rushed over to him. Li Aidang didn't expect his mother to be so excited, so he staggered and almost fell.

Li Aidang was very excited, "Mom, we are back!"

Niu Cuihua cried and said, "It's good that you're back, it's good that you're back. You don't know how worried I've been these past few days. I thought you said you'd come back, but you haven't shown up yet. I thought something happened to you."

As soon as these words were spoken, Li Aidang blinked and his face froze.