Following the Khmer Rouge takeover of Cambodia in 1975, "Year Zero" became the beginning of the destruction of the previous regime, many of its officials and teachers, and its education system. With the expulsion of the Khmer Rouge in 1979, the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports (MoEYS) faced a massive task of rebuilding an education system with strictly limited numbers of teachers, materials, and classrooms. By the first decade of the twenty-first century, considerable progress had been made in the task of rehabilitating the essentials of the primary school system, with majority enrolments of both girls and boys, emerging improvements in retention, and the beginnings of a modern curriculum. The basis had been established for planning more sophisticated standards of learning to enable the Cambodian economy to prosper. [For the complete volume, "Education in Cambodia: From Year Zero towards International Standards. Education in the Asia-Pacific Region: Issues, Concerns and Prospects. Volume 64," see ED675723.]