Overseas students’ number rising
Print Edition
THERE has been an increase in the number of overseas students enrolling for degree courses in Shanghai universities, educational authorities said yesterday. And much of it has to do with the universities’ English language curriculums.
“Though the number of overseas students remained between 50,000 and 60,000, the number of students applying for degrees here has been increasing,” said Yang Weiren, the director of international exchange and cooperation department of Shanghai Education Commission. A total of 16,000 overseas students are seeking degrees here, which was up 3.5 percent from 2014.
“Students for both the masters and doctorate increased by more than 12 percent in 2015 from a year before,” he said without giving specific numbers.
Yang said that was because Shanghai was consciously making efforts to adjust the structure to attract overseas students to the city. “To study in local universities, foreigners first have to acquire fluency in the Chinese language, which makes it difficult for overseas students,” he said.
Currently, 317 courses taught in English have won financial support from the government.
Fudan University developed Chinese Politics and Diplomacy as its first course to be taught completely in English in 2006 and added 32 others in the following years.
Anna Volkova from Russia is studying Chinese economy at Fudan. “We came here to gain professional knowledge,” she said. “It would be impossible to do that in Chinese while learning the language! But in order to survive here and expand the language skills we take additional Chinese courses.”
But the language of education can be tricky too. Byron Murphy, an Irish student at Fudan, said, in general, “the professors have a very good level of English and can communicate without any problem.”
“But while doing my first year of masters here, there was one professor who could speak English but could not understand any of our questions,” he said.
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