Programs & Community

University of Oregon- University of Washington-University of British Columbia: Northwest China Forum

In 2014, Madeleine Yue Dong (Chair, China Studies, UW), Timothy Cheek (Director, Institute for Asian Research, UBC), and Bryna Goodman (then Asian Studies Director, UO) met at the national Association for Asian Studies annual conference in Philadelphia and organized a planning committee, in the interest of forming a NW China Forum. This Forum provides communication and research links among the three NW universities with substantial China studies programs and ties to universities and scholars in China. The inaugural UO-UW-UBC Forum, which brought together approximately 40 China-specialist faculty (including several visiting scholars from China) and 9 graduate students from the three institutions, took place at UO Portland in March 2015, with support from the Center for Asian and Pacific, Asian Studies, UO Portland, the UO Confucius Institute, and the Office of International Affairs.

Panels and lunch discussions enabled the participants to present research, discuss recent developments in China affecting research and fieldwork, and share pedagogical strategies. Elisabeth Perry (Henry Rosovsky Professor of Government at Harvard, and Director of the Harvard-Yenching Institute) spoke on the topic:  “China’s Higher Education Reform: A New Great Leap Forward?”  Lorri Hagman of the University of Washington Press attended, and met with scholars to discuss the publication of manuscripts. Within a year, these preliminary meetings led to positive results, with the publication of books by UO professors.

The second Forum took place in April 2016 at the University of Washington, following the same general framework with the addition of the common reading of a recent Chinese novel and presentations of new book manuscripts by junior scholars. The third forum is scheduled for April 2017, after which UO will begin the cycle again, hosting the forum in 2018.


The University of Oregon Confucius Institute for Global China Studies

The UO Confucius Institute for Global China Studies (CI) was initiated by the Office of International Affairs (OIA) in 2009 as part of a growing national and international trend to expand educational ties with China, to promote Chinese language training, and to further intercultural understanding. It was inaugurated in October 2010 and has recently been integrated into the Global Studies Institute under the auspices of OIA. The Institute is made possible with the support of our partners in China: The Chinese Language Council International in Beijing (Hanban) and East China Normal University in Shanghai (ECNU).

Recognizing China’s growing cultural, educational, economic, environmental, political and technological role in the world, the UO CI highlights programs and activities related to four themes: Chinese culture across borders; Chinese futures and global futures; Chinese culture on a world stage; China and global sustainability. Building upon UO’s strength in China Studies, the focus of the CI from the beginning is not language teaching (the stock activity of Confucius Institutes worldwide), but the development and coordination of cross-campus programming and interdisciplinary events related to China. In the last six years, the CI has worked with almost all China-related units on campus, including the Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures, the Department of History, the Department of Art History, the Department of Religious Studies, the Department of Comparative Literature within CAS; the Center for Asian and Pacific Studies, the School of Dance and Music, the School of Journalism, the Law School, the School of Architecture and Allied Arts, and the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Arts, among others.

The mainstay of the CI programming is the Confucius Institute Lecture Series, through which we have invited scholars and researchers from all over the world to UO Eugene and UO Portland to give talks and present their works. With the help of the volunteer instructors sent by ECNU, the CI has also actively engaged in UO student life via our collaboration with the Global Scholars Hall, the Yamada Language Center, the Mills International Center, and the Craft Center in Erb Memorial Union. We have been a regular participant in the cultural events and activities in the Eugene area and beyond, in cooperation with such community cultural institutions the Eugene Public Library, the Eugene Symphony, and the Oregon Asian Celebration.

Recently, collaborative efforts between the two partner institutions—UO and ECNU—have expanded. ECNU has become a key collaborator in a number of UO faculty research and student initiatives in China facilitated by OIA and CI. For example, the UO Center for Women and Gender Studies has sent scholars to and hosted colleagues from ECNU for conferences and discussion panels; the Language Teaching Master Program initiated by the UO Linguistics Department has been talking with their colleagues in ECNU about a joint degree program utilizing the strength of ECNU in language teaching and teacher training. We see deepening this kind of scholarly exchanges and cooperation a promising area of growth for future CI programming.


University of Oregon Flagship Program

The University of Oregon Chinese Flagship Program provides students with the opportunity to develop professional-level proficiency in Chinese while studying any academic major of their choice. Flagship courses blend language and culture learning with contemporary topics, including journalism, psychology, folklore, geography, physics, and business. Because of the cross-disciplinary focus of the Flagship Program, most students double major in Chinese and another academic area; students frequently select internationally focused majors. In addition to explicit language instruction, students enroll in regular academic courses taught in Chinese by faculty from many UO departments. They receive mentoring from native Chinese-speaking peer language partners, tutoring and domain training from native Chinese-speaking graduate students, personalized language clinics taught by university faculty, and access to summer immersion programs. As juniors and seniors, students study abroad in China for one academic year. They enroll in graduate-level courses in their individual field of interest with Chinese-speaking peers. Students then complete a four-month, full-time internship related to their major and career interests. Flagship graduates reach Superior-level Mandarin Chinese proficiency and have the opportunity to earn certification through The Language Flagship. Graduating Flagship Scholars are poised to enter competitive graduate programs or high-powered careers. Flagship alumni continue to use their Chinese language and culture skills on a daily basis during their careers. Some serve as translators, bilingual accountants, high school educators, or medical professionals. Others have gone on to found their own businesses working directly with Chinese professionals.

The University of Oregon Chinese Flagship Program is funded by The Language Flagship through the National Security Education Program. Students in the program are eligible for generous scholarships throughout their academic learning careers. All Flagship students receive scholarship aid, and summer intensive programs are fully funded. Most students have their year abroad fully funded through scholarships and fellowships. Due to the rigorous nature of the program, Flagship students are also highly competitive candidates for additional scholarships, such as the Boren, Freeman, Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS), UO Diversity and Excellence, UO Presidential, and others. Additional scholarships dedicated to UO Flagship students are provided by UO Enrollment Management and donations from Mr. and Mrs. Pete and Christine Nickerson.


Lundquist College of Business Engaging Asia Student Program

The Engaging Asia Student Program was initiated in 2005, and its first participants were from the Warsaw Sports Marketing students. The program proved to be effective in exchanging ideas about sports marketing with colleagues in China, and in 2008, Professor Paul Swangard worked with the Center for Asian and Pacific Studies to expand the program to include students who were planning to work at the Beijing Olympics.

Over the next few years, the program evolved further, eventually providing access to all MBA students at the University of Oregon in Eugene. Thanks to a generous gift from Jim Bramson, Engaging Asia was able to fund a set of fellowships to subsidize the price of trip for the students. Some 35-50 students are able to spend two weeks in China in September, before their second year of the MBA program begins. The fellowships have made this opportunity available to a wide range of participants.

The program takes advantage of alumni and friend connections to build a series of visits with Chinese firms and factories. Students also often visit the offices of American companies that have a presence in China. For example, they have been to the Shanghai office of Wieden and Kennedy, where they gain a better understanding of the viewpoints of Chinese consumers. Students also have visited Tim Hardin, who is an executive with Silicon Valley Bank working in China, and dropped in on the Warsaw family hat factory outside of Shanghai. Generally the program takes students to Shanghai and Beijing, where they learn more about government, culture, and the economy, before flying to either Hong Kong or Singapore to learn more about the business environment outside the mainland.

Alumni have provided many connections that enrich student experience. For example, Qingdong Liu, a UO architecture alumnus and managing partner at AECOM, has actively participated. Richard Seau, the head of Sports Singapore, also is a UO graduate, and he has been helpful in orienting students to business in Singapore, as well as in assisting interns who can spend a summer there.

Overall, this experientially-based program has enhanced the international knowledge of MBA students, several of whom have found jobs in Asia. According to student feedback the experience makes them more likely to go to Asia in the future.


Chinese Independent Film Series

Many people do not realize that China has a large number of talented and daring independent filmmakers who produce illuminating documentaries, remarkable feature films, and brilliant animation outside the state film system. These films often are only shown in small “art” venues and informal networks of screenings in China, and circulate outside of China only through the dedicated efforts of a small collective of critics, curators and film producers. UO has twice hosted a mini-festival of Chinese independent films made available through this collective. The first took place in spring 2010 under the aegis of Cinema Pacific and the UO Confucius Institute, bringing two young Chinese filmmakers and (then Beijing-based) China film curator Shelly Kraicer. In October, 2016, Shelly Kraicer will return to present a selection of five films in a mini-festival entitled, “China Now: Independent Visions,” with support from the Center for Asian and Pacific Studies, Academic Affairs, the Global Studies Institute, the Oregon Humanities Center’s Endowment for Public Outreach in the Arts, Sciences and Humanities, Asian Studies and East Asian Languages and Literatures. The film fees UO pays for the film go directly to the support of the Chinese independent filmmakers.

 


U.S.-China Climate-Smart & Low-Carbon Cities Summit

The second annual U.S.-China Climate-Smart/Low-Carbon Cities Summit in Beijing on June 7 and 8, hosted Mayors and executive staff from over 20 US and 40 Chinese cities. The Summit corresponded with Secretary of State John Kerry and Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew’s visit to China for the U.S.-China Strategic Economic Dialogues; which included meetings with Chinese President Xi Jingping. Given the strained relations over actions in the South China Sea, the Climate Summit provided the opportunity for both national governments and local leaders to focus on collaborative learning to take action on reducing carbon emissions. The Summit served as a continuation of the work started with the group last year in LA, and the subsequent COP21-Climate Agreements in Paris this last winter.

 “For several years, Eugene has been one of the cities out in front in working toward a low-carbon future. The adoption of the Climate Recovery Ordinance in July 2014 made Eugene one of the first cities in the country to place the City’s fossil fuel and greenhouse gas reduction targets into City code, although our work had been underway since we conducted our first greenhouse gas inventory in 2009, and subsequently developed the 2010 Community Climate and Energy Action Plan,” said Mayor Piercy. The summit is a public/private partnership between the U.S. State Department, the Chinese Government, and the C40 Cities Program in association with Bloomberg Philanthropies. The non-profit C40 Cities funded all travel expenses for Mayor Piercy and accompanying staff.

The summit featured more than a dozen sessions led by leading NGOs, research institutes, and government agencies. It included a lowcarbon exhibition, as well as major announcements in areas including transportation, access to financing, and city-level partnerships. Mayor Piercy participated in the session titled ‘City Low Carbon Economy Transition’, hosted by the Center for Climate Strategies (CCS), World Resources Institute (WRI),and the National Center for Climate Change Strategy and International Cooperation (NCSC). Other panelists included Chinese officials from Chengdu, Jilin Huaibei, and Jinchang; with Mayor Wade Troxell of Fort Collins, CO joining the mayoral presentations. The second section of the session included a panel discussion with executive leaders from CCS, WRI, NCSC, World Bank, and China Center for Urban Development. An overview of Eugene Mayor Piercy’s visit, in an effort to bridge the gap between community and climate action. Mayor Piercy took part in the official function of the Summit with Secretary of State John Kerry, Department of Energy Deputy Secretary Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, Beijing Mayor Wang Anshun, US Special Envoy for Climate Change Dr. Jonathan Pershing, China Special Representative for Climate Change Affairs Xie Zhenhua, and US Ambassador to China Senator Max Baucus. In addition to the official functions, the Mayor was able to spend time experiencing the culture of one of the world’s greatest cities with over 3,000 years of history to share. This included walking through the historical Huatong neighborhoods, Tiananmen Square, Forbidden Palace, Great Wall, and a tour with US Mayors of the Temple of Heaven.

Representing Eugene was an honor for Mayor Piercy and one that was resoundingly popular. Overwhelmingly, when she shared that she was the Mayor of Eugene, both US and Chinese attendees responded excitedly, with warm admiration for Eugene and our community. While the trip to China was exceptional, the Eugene delegation was very happy to be back in the Willamette Valley to our home. A land with clean water, clean air, productive industry, quality educational institutions, and a community that engages in deciding the future.