this news about a strange pneumonia It was a distant echo for young foreigners enjoying Christmas in their country before continuing the course in China. They never came back. First Wuhan closed, then Hubei and finally the whole country. There were students beyond borders. this coronavirus stopped the races derailed some of them and plunged everyone into uncertainty and helplessness. This week, two and a half years later, China reopens its doors to students.
To Kaopod, a Thai woman in her twenties, while relaxing in Bangkok after her first year in International Relations at the prestigious Fudan University (Shanghai), her sister told her about an epidemic. “The center initially asked us not to go back, and in March China announced that it would be closing soon, so we had to fly out urgently, but I I was still afraid. I studied online from Thailand, but left it in the third semester,” he says, and adds: “Everything remained in China. My friends, my clothes… I had just paid a year’s rent for the flat, i lost a lot of moneyI didn’t know what to do with my life,” she continues.
Several Chinese embassies announced this week that they are re-issuing student visas to residents. The measure highlights the trend after paperwork for other visas was shortened in June and the quarantine was reduced to seven days at a hotel and three days at home. Airline prices continue to risehuge problem for students and still presents China majors limitations of the worldbut a relief compared to the impregnable wall months ago.
“Start from scratch”
“Most of the Spanish students were blocked and very few were able to return. A small percentage continued to work online. It is possible in careers such as translation or international relations, but face-to-face classes are mandatory in technical careers. “Most of them dropped out of their PhDs and started from scratch in another country,” said Pedro Laborda, professor at Nantong University and head of the China-Spain Research Network. to travel abroad.
stranded in Spain for years rumors to open soon, without further proof After the National People’s Congress, after the New Year holidays, after the Winter Olympics in Beijing… “I was looking for information on Chinese websites, keeping in touch with other students in my case, the Spanish and Chinese embassies but always everything is tied to Beijing. they said it was… years of frustration and uncertaintyThe 24-year-old Catalan Pol wants to return to Shanghai to perfect the Mandarin language, but will wait for China to normalize its relationship with the coronavirus.
Chinese student attraction
In 2019, still before the pandemic, half a million foreigners studied in China. The third market after the United Kingdom and the United States, it is a prominent leader with one million students. 60% come from Asia (South Korea, Thailand, Pakistan, India) and the number of Africans is increasing. According to official data, almost half of the scholarships in Sub-Saharan Africa are paid by Beijing. Education is a “soft power” pillar China is pursuing to increase its global influence. The UK in its distant glory, and even today the USA, preceded it in the formation of scientists, intellectuals or politicians. Ignorance, stereotypes and prejudices about China make the education of foreign elites urgent for Beijing.
Almost two weeks of them remained in China. 200 Spanish students before the pandemic. The second figure is explained with some audacity and profuse ignorance: China remains a culturally distant destination, even geographically, with a strange language and other major challenges. No country is more generous with scholarshipsa remnant of empire that the opening did not lighten, with a more promising labor horizon, an eagerness for more universities for foreign talent, and a more respectful respect for education.
scholarship policy
“It’s common for China to pay for tuitions and offer many research positions with good salaries and flights to Spain. In Europe and the US it’s more complicated. Many students get scholarships and get promoted,” Laborda explains. a chinese ecosystem conducive to study and research, with a determined state impulse already buried the times of rough copies and cheap manufactures. It has left behind a decade past the US in patents in the industry’s prestigious journals and scientific production last year.
There are doubts about how long it will take for China to recover because other countries are busy filling the gap and zero policy covid created understandable grudges and insecurity. “It’s going to be a fast process. Chinese universities are asking for foreign students and they’re improving our curriculum a lot,” says Laborda.