HOHHOT - At 7 am every morning, 56-year-old Jing Fengying and her husband, Zhang Youbing, wake up their four foster children and spend an hour dressing and feeding them. They need to leave by 8 am for classes.

The couple have devoted eight years to caring for abandoned children in their home at the Hohhot Children's Welfare Institute, Inner Mongolia autonomous region. In 2009, the institute hired them to serve as foster parents for four disabled children.

They live in a three-bedroom house at the institute and are responsible for the day-to-day care of the children until they are either legally adopted or reach their 18th birthday.