No.2
11/30/2015
http://world.people.com.cn/n/2015/1130/c100227873239.html?from=singlemessage&isappinstalled=0
An American University President: Why I support Confucius Institute
World. People.com.cn Chen Xingxing, Han Shasha
Nov. 30, 2015
People’s Net The planned model CI building in Western Kentucky University, USA has finally got a
breakthrough. The construction project broke the ground at the end of November and it is expected to
be finished next June.
This will be the only new CI building to be built in America and funded by Hanban. Up till now, the
Confucius Institutes in America “lodge” either in other buildings on university campus or in an old
building with some reconstruction. According to the agreement between Hanban and WKU, the land
offered by the university to construct the new CI building on will be free for the model CI to use in the
following 50 years and university will not change the use of the land.
The agreement was faced with lots of disputes. During the 23-month-long preparation, Gary A.
Ransdell, president of Western Kentucky University played a leading role.
Either the president himself or the directors of the CI received many phone calls and were asked to
answer questions about the purpose, functions, funding and property rights relating to the building.
Local media published 26 articles to discuss these questions.
Facing the disputes, Dr. Ransdell insisted that it fits the core benefit of WKUto build a model CI
building and helps to promote the development of the CI. On Oct. 16, he stated, “I think WKU should
support Chinese cultural programs and the Confucius Institute is a good conduit.”
Why does an American university president support Confucius programs? Can the CI at WKU set an
example for other Confucius Institutes to follow?
The journalists from People’s Net interviewed President Ransdell and in more than a month that
followed, they communicated with people from different circles and observed what the CI at WKU is
going on with.
About the achievements, “Judging from all aspects, this is a wonderful story of success.”
Where is the Western Kentucky University?
Driving north from Nashville, the capital of American country music and travelling through all the
farms and green landscape all the way, you can reach WKU in an hour.
The Western Kentucky University, which started in 1906, is located in Kentucky. According to the
data by the US Census Bureau, the population in the state in 2014 is 4,413,000 and the whites consists
of 88.3% while the Asians are only 1.4%. Different from the multicultural metropolises like New
York, Los Angeles and San Francisco, Bowling Green where WKU is located, has very few Chinese
faces and Chinese elements.
It is in such an original American rural city that the Confucius Institute from China develops rapidly
and arouses enthusiasm for Chinese Culture.
When the interview began, President Ransdell actively talked about the CI at WKU.
When expressing his ideas, the American University was using “we” rather than “they” or “you”. He
said, “We have made great progress in 5 years and achieved quite a lot. I am quite satisfied to see the
development of our CI. What’s more, the CI has impact on our campus and our community. The
Chinese courses in many local schools are taught by Hanban teachers.
Dr. Ransdell said, “Judging from all aspects, this is a wonderful story of success.”
The CI at WKU was first established in 2010 and the co-operative partner from China is North China
Electric Power University. In the beginning, the CI had only 11 Chinese teachers. They taught
Chinese in 11 schools of 4 school districts in Kentucky. Now, after 5 years’ development, the CI at
WKU has 47 Chinese teachers and they teach in 21 school districts. The number of the students who
register in the Chinese program has reached 13,580.
Shown on the website of Hanban, till Dec. 7, 2014, 475 Confucius Institutes had been established
globally and 100 of them are in America. The CI at WKU is one of the two model CIs in US and the
other is in San Diego State University.
The story of success especially shows on two “special things” mentioned by President Ransdell: the
Chinese Culture Experiencing Mobile and the Chinese Learning Center.
The Chinese Culture Experiencing Mobile is retrofitted from a RV. In a space of close to 56 square
meters are laid costumes in China’s Qing Dynasty, paper cutting, stationary such as writing brushes,
ink sticks, paper and ink stones, slips of bamboo for writing, Chinese musical instruments like Erhu
and cymbals, traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture as well as typical Chinese toys.
Martin Cohron of the CI at WKU, who acts as the driver of the mobile and commentator, has a
profound Chinese name Kong Maoting(孔茂庭). Over the past 2 years, Mr. Kong Maoting has been to
over 200 places with the mobile and introduced Chinese culture to more than 30,000 visiting students,
teaching and administrative staff as well as community members. He, in his 50s, says that the mobile
is his “baby”.
When interviewed, he was busy preparing for the training of the in-service Hanban volunteer teachers
and had been working late several days in a row. But when he began to introduce his “baby”, his
tiredness was immediately gone and he became energetic. The pride on his face and the passion on
him always make the audience on site think that his is talking about the culture of his own country.
Dr. Pan Wei-ping, director of the CI at WKU said that the Confucius can be sent to those remote areas
with the mobile unit so that more Americans can experience Chinese language and culture.
Besides, the Chinese Learning Center is set in the entrance hall of the university library, which has a
display area of 651square meters, assembled with 7 digital touch screens with each introducing
accordingly ancient science and technology in China, Chinese characters, scholars of the past, paper
cutting, musical instruments, martial arts and China’s cities. The Chinese Learning Center also
showcases many samples of Chinese culture. According to Dr. Pan’s introduction, the number of the
students and community members who come to visit it reaches over 15,000 annually on average.
Dr. Ransdell said that there over 20,000 students in WKU, but not everyone has a chance to visit
China. However, for the 4 years on campus, they are sure to go to the library. “Every time the students
go to the library, they will pass the Chinese Learning Center, which is a direct way to be exposed to
Chinese culture.”
About the support: “Understanding China is a necessary part for our students to go international.”
Why the CI at WKU can develop quickly is that President Ransdell definitely supports the program.
Why does he so definitely support the CI? Ransdell says that the Confucius Institute can help WKU’s
strategy of international reach because our students and the public can experience China here, making
“China” a real existence within everyone’s touch.
During the interview, internationalization had been mentioned many times by this American
university president. He said, “I hope that my students can grow up with confidence, and understand
the importance to be a world citizen.”
Dr.Ransdell recalled that it was ten years ago when WKU decided to bring internationalization into
campus. “After we knew about Confucius Institute, we made up our minds to establish one at WKU.
Then we contacted Hanban to apply for setting up a CI. From then on, we have promoted actively the
CI as an important part of the strategies of our university internationalization.”
WKU also set up Chinese flagship program and Chinese language major, together with CI as a threeprong approach to promote Chinese language program at WKU.
When he was asked about How CI could help WKU reach the goal of internationalization, he said, “CI
brought us many opportunities, and enabled us to organize teaching affairs and other events.”
He said, without Hanban’s financial support, WKU is unable to hire 47 Chinese teachers to teach
Chinese at public schools. More importantly, Hanban gives universities and CIs autonomy rights, and
respects local universities’ culture, school system, and campus environment.
According to Dr. Ransdell’s thoughts, with the rising of China’s economy, China is playing a more
and more important role in international society. The world is eager to know about this biggest
developing country, and America also wants to understand China’s economic impact on this world.
Chinese will become a world language in the near future. To know about China and understand it, is
an indispensable part of students’ international experience.
However, for most of American students, China is still a distant and mysterious country. Even though
WKU sends many students to China to exchange every year, not every student can have such a great
opportunity. Dr. Ransdell said, “If our students cannot study abroad, we bring the world in front of
them. We are trying our best to create opportunities to let them experience the internationalization.”
Understanding China is not only the need of the world development but also the need of individuals’
growth. Such kind of perspective is gaining more popularity at WKU and in the local communities.
Cloverport School District in Bowling Green is one of the districts with Chinese teachers sent from
the CI at WKU. Mr. Charles Proffit, superintendent of this district, said that he was very happy to
hear that parents told him their children had learned more new knowledge about China. He thinks that
learning Chinese and Chinese culture gives students more competence advantages than the others so
that they can find better opportunities in China.
Alfonso De Torres Nunez, KDE World Language Consultant, told us that students usually need to
learn at least 5 foreign languages in Kentucky. Spanish is the first foreign language, and Chinese is the
second.
Dr. Ransdell thinks that quite a lot of Chinese have lived in San Francisco and New York for a long
time, and Chinese culture has a great impact in these areas. While in Kentucky, everything about
China is new, to the local people, new culture, new ideas, and new knowledge. But he emphasizes that
“That’s the value of Confucius Institute. CI has a very spacious room to develop here because Chinese
history and culture are not that well known.”
About the future: “There will be more universities willing to set up CIs.”
When Dr. Ransdell talked about the development of CI, he thought that there would be increasingly
more universities, like WKU, paying more attention to international exchange and cooperation. They
will even think more highly of that than WKU does. There will be more universities willing to set up
CIs, which is the development opportunity for CI. Last December, when he attended the Global CI
Conference, “Someone asked me how to apply to set up a new CI via Hanban.”
How can a CI get sustainable development? Dr. Pan Wei-ping, director of WKU CI thinks that there
are two key points. One is localization, which means CI should merge into local university’s
developing goals and core interests; the other one is to “make CI itself capable enough”, which can
make the local university and the public confident and trustful for the development of CI.
In his view, the bottleneck of CI development may lie in teachers and textbooks. Only when Hanban
teachers have local teaching certificates, can they teach like the other American teachers. If they don’t
have, they cannot teach alone. They need a certified American teacher accompanying with. It’s hard
for the American schools to accept for they are facing the lack of educational resources and funds.
How can the CI at WKU solve this problem? WKU CI cooperate with WKU College of Education
and Behavioral Sciences and Kentucky Education Professional Standards Board, providing all kinds
of service for Hanban teachers to help them get Kentucky teaching certificates. By now, there have
been 51 teachers who get Kentucky teaching certificates. WKU CI is the only one in America which
can help Hanban teachers get certificates.
Dr. Pan said, “Our teacher resource is guaranteed through this approach. Right now, the school
districts ask for teachers from CI actively and they pay for this kind of cooperation.”
More than one teacher told our journalists, they often go to audit other American teachers’ teaching,
so they can learn different kinds of teaching methods and strategies, and apply them to their own
teaching. Sometimes, American teachers also come to observe their classes, and communicate with
them so that they can learn from each other the strong points to offset one's weakness.
Ms. Li Bo, WKU CI director from China, thinks the communication at CI is a two-way interaction.
Chinese teachers teach Chinese language and Chinese culture to students and local residents. Likewise,
they are also experiencing and learning American language, culture and way of life.
Bin Mingzhi has come to America over 3 months. She is teaching Chinese at a local school. She
teaches 5 classes and she has 80 students, an hour a day for each class . “when I first came here, I
found the students really knew nothing about China.”
Now there are 4 Chinese in this small town, 3 other Chinese teachers and her. She often comes across
some parents who kindly say hello to her in the streets. Last time, when she wanted to teach with a
piano, one parent even carried their home piano to school, and let her use it.
Lin Weipeng, who is teaching at Bulter County, also feels the passion and kindness from American
people. He has 790 students in total. He is often touched by his students and the local people.
Confucius Institute, sows many a seed of studying Chinese and harvest many a flower of friendship.
The year 2015 will pass in just one month. Dr. Ransdell and Dr. Pan Wei-Ping , have started to make
a higher goal for their wonderful story of success: they are trying to increase the number of students
who study Chinese to 15,000 in the school year of 2015-2016,and to 45,000 till the year 2025.
Dr.Ransdell said, there are over 100 CIs in America, and over 470 ones in the world. Only a small
number of universities chose not to set up CI. “I hope WKU CI can last over 50 years even 100 years.”