Chinese Students Visit USN

Ten middle school students with two chaperones from Chang-wai school in China came to visit USN for a week as part II of our Chinese student exchange project. These ten middle school students received a warm welcome on Monday morning, hosted by several USN eighth graders as well as the eight USN high school students who went to China in June.

These Chinese students stayed with their hosting families at night and “shadowed” the hosting students to go to each hosting student’s class in the morning. They also visited several high school classes, such as Dance, Vocal Ensemble, Comparative Religions, and Jazz Band.

The office of International Affairs at Vanderbilt University hosted a luncheon discussion by Dr. Xiu Cravens for our guests while providing a VU campus tour. In the afternoon, they went to the Parthenon, the Hermitage, Laser Tag, and a bowling alley. On Wednesday night, they went to Opry Mills as a group with their hosting families as a finale for this event. They had a great week of practicing their English, getting to know and understand American culture, and enjoying a typical school day in America.

One chaperone was an awarded seventh grade English teacher while the other was a high school teacher who taught philosophy and ethics. They both asked me to relay their highest gratitude to the school. They were most impressed with our teamwork that incorporated numerous departments on a daily basis, as well as our preparation and communication among different departments and divisions to make this program run so smoothly and seamlessly. It took 110 people to put this event together across 15 departments/offices within and without USN.

On behalf of the planning committee, Dr. Erskine White, Mrs. Mei-Yen Cracraft and I would like to express our appreciation to everyone involved. I especially would like to thank the twelve hosting families who were so flexible and so willing to change their daily routine to accommodate the visiting schedule and provide the most meaningful living experiences for our guests. Our hosting families are top-notch and are indeed our backbone to make this event happen. I am in debt to these wonderful and gorgeous families.

I also would like to thank Vince Durnan, who initiated this new vision as part of the Global Education Initiatives and embarked first with his visit to China in March 2013, followed by Jeff Greenfield and my explorative trip in June 2013, which led to the China Trip in May-June 2014.

We completed the second part of this project with our visitors from China this past week. The vision, generosity, and hospitality were above and beyond what we have dreamed of. Congratulations, USN, for hosting a historical first time Chinese student exchange project during our centennial year. Wow!