The Chinese are Coming! The Koreans are Already Here, So

What

The Fraught Exchange between Chinese

International Undergraduate Students and the

American University

Jiyeon Kang and Nancy Abelmann

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The Number of Chinese Students in the United States

2008/2009 2009/2010 2010/2011

Chinese UG 26,228 39,948 57,036

Chinese total 98,235 127,628 157,558

Korean UG 52,095 36,234 37,922

Korean total 75,065 72,153 73,351

Indian UG 15,600 14,025 15,210

Indian total 103,260 104,897 103,895

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Questions

How to understand the American media’s quite

particular attention to Chinese students?

How is the Chinese Student in America viewed by

the media – and by American university

administrators, Chinese students, American

students and their parents, and Chinese parents?

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American Media Discourse onChinese Undergraduate Students

American Imagination of China: A Fabled Market and “Yellow

Peril”

South Korea, an Unthreatening Mini-Me

Three Imaginations of Chinese Undergraduate Students

an ever-expanding market a fair exchange between excellent American higher education and

exemplary Chinese youth a fraught exchange with questions about the real value of both

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November 2010 November 2011

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China Boom China Conundrum

Exponential growth of middle class

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One child policy

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Desire for education

American universities’ drive to expand their international appeal

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Chinese “frenzy” for an American university education

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Aggressive admissions-agent industry

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Historical Imaginations of China

Fascination with the Chinese Market“Fabled market”“The El Dorado of commerce”“A billion bellies out there”

Inassimilable Other and the “Yellow Peril”“The Chinese Invasion”“Last Days of the Republic”

Red Menace and the Lost Market During the Cold War“Dangerous foe, a brutal master, and an efficient tyranny”anxiety over a lost market

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Imaginations of Chinese Students:Inevitable Client of and a Threat to American Liberal

Education

“Native would be missionaries” and “directing elites” who would reform the primitive consciousness of China (1870-80)

“I’m not sure that it is good policy to educate representatives of the warlike Chinese people, whose number is four hundred or five hundred million” (Senator Gallinger, 1912)

“Future democratic forces” that would “exert a profound influence on the future course of their country” (1950s)

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South Korea, an Unthreatening Mini-Me

I was having lunch with the President of South Korea. I was interested in education policy -- they've grown enormously over the last 40 years. And I asked him, what are the biggest challenges in your education policy?  He said, the biggest challenge that I have is that my parents are too demanding.  He said, even if somebody is dirt poor, they are insisting that their kids are getting the best education….That was the biggest education challenge that he had, was an insistence, a demand from parents for excellence in the schools.

- Barack Obama, “Remarks by the President on the ’Education To Innovate’ Campaign” 2009

 

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How do they do it? Their formula is relatively simple. They take South Korea's top-scoring middle school students, put those who aspire to an American university in English-language classes, taught by Korean and highly paid American and other foreign teachers, emphasize composition and other skills crucial to success on the SATs and college admissions essays, and urge them on to unceasing study.

- NYT 2008

But it tailors its academic courses to American expectations, said Executive Director Don Shim, with creative teaching techniques and different types of classes. This summer, the academy is offering a debate class to bolster students' communication skills. "Many students know the answer, but they don't know how to explain it," Shim said.

- Washington Post 2009

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Imagination of China 1: The Ever Expanding Market

The growth of the nation’s economy – and the surge in Shanghai real-estate prices – has helped create 700,000 new millionaires and a middle class of more than 300 million.- San Jose Mercury News 2011

The great number of Chinese families with disposable income, two working parents, and only one child, and a determination to invest their money to make sure that child receives the best education possible - New York Times 2010

Ninety percent of Chinese High school students want to study overseas…. About 10 million young people take China’s college entrance exam each year and only 1 million pass it.- Portland Press Herald 2011

If we build it, they will come.- The Clover Herald 2007

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A. The Liberal American University’s Gift to the Chinese Antipodal Other

I heard that America was a more-free country…I didn’t want to study for a number on a test. I wanted to study for the fun of learning.- San Jose Mercury News 2011

The University of Virginia really encouraged me to think as an independent person and not be afraid to speak my mind.- Washington Post 2009

In the U.S. they focus on creative-thinking skills, while in China they only focus on theory… so what university students learn here [in China] doesn’t prepare them for the real world.

The experience has given her a deep appreciation for the West’s values of transparency and access to information…. In China, I’m used to secrecy, so being 18 and able to touch history with my bare fingers really impressed me.- New York Times 2010

Imagination 2: A Fair Exchange

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B. The Exemplary Chinese Student Enlightening and Internationalizing the American

Classmate

Well, youth of America, you better look back because they are gaining on

you. Here come the Chinese and Indian youths who are serious about

making their country No. 1 in this new global economy… If our schools

continue on the present course of not challenging students and continue

to move them along [regardless], then our students will become the

customer service telephone answering people in the future, replacing

those now operating in foreign countries.- San Antonio Express 2006

It’s ‘the next best thing’ for their children, after studying abroad.

- USA Today 2009

What a wonderful resource for Clinton County students to be able to

mingle with people of a different culture and a different perspective on

global markets - The Press-Republican (NY) 2009

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A. American Educational Exceptionalism?

Chinese Students as Cash Cows

American universities are also shopping for partners that will polish their reputations…. Some schools want to cash in on an enormous market for education in the most populous nation on the planet.

-The News & Observer (NC) 2006

Isomorphic Global universities

But over the next decade, the number of Chinese students applying to UVA may drop off as more Chinese students decide to attend college within their own country’s borders. In 1999, China launched a multi-billion dollar, 20-year effort to increase the quality of its higher education system.

- - The Clover Herald 2007

Imagination 3: A Faltering Exchange

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B. The Exemplary Chinese Student?

[Admission officers] spend their time on Chinese applications trying to parse the essays – paying particular attention, as they might with an American candidate, to whether they detect the authentic voice and sensibility - New York Times 2011

Within a couple of weeks, all but three of the non-Chinese students had dropped the course. Why did the American students flee? ''They said the class was very quiet,'' recalls Dr. St. Pierre…. During quizzes, Dr. St. Pierre now requires everyone to leave their books at the front of the classroom to prevent cheating.

- New York Times 2011

Chinese graduates go to American universities to attain respected degrees, but retain the expectation that their nation will soon retake its rightful place as a great power. - Washington Times 2010

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The quality of both American higher education and the Chinese student are called into question

Idealistic notions of internationalization or international exchange are called into question

The exchange between American higher education and the Chinese student is risky, uncertain at best and deceptive at worst.

Conclusion