 Mao's stated aim for the policy was to ensure that urban students could "develop their talents to the full" through education amongst the rural population.Many fresh high school graduates, who became known as the so-called sent-down youth (also known in China as "educated youth" and abroad as "rusticated youth"), were forced out of the cities and effectively exiled to remote areas of China.Some commentators consider these people, many of whom lost the opportunity to attend university, China's "lost generation".