Development of CI-PITT:
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Great progress and growth has occurred this year for CI-Pitt as we have expanded across the state of Pennsylvania and have developed larger, permanent and more comprehensive programs in the schools. Our new collaboration in Berks County PA allows us to offer Chinese in several more schools in the eastern half of our region. Our program now has a system of support that can sustain Chinese language and culture in many forms to many different kinds of schools.
Our model is a based on a tiered system whereby we can offer schools with no Chinese language the opportunity to have speakers or day-long programs up to new programs that are supported with a Hanban volunteer. Our most comprehensive language partner-ships are formed when a permanent hire teacher is paired with a Hanban volunteer and these two or three teachers can expand the program beyond just a middle or high school. Finally, CI-Pitt, in con-junction with the National Consortium for Teaching about Asia (NCTA) is developing a fully comprehensive Center of Excellence initiative to create both language proficiency and core course knowledge (in Chinese literature, music, fine arts and history) for highly motivated high school students. We hope to establish five Confucius Classrooms from our five outstanding satellite centers (see Organizational Structure) and anticipate two additional Confucius Classrooms by fall of 2010.
Our undergraduate initiatives include our popular Pitt in Wuhan Program whereby Pitt under-graduates spend six weeks on the campus of our partner institution, Wuhan University. Last sum-mer 18 Pitt students studied and toured on this program deepening their Chinese language skills and learning first-hand about Chinese culture by visiting the Three Rivers Gorge, Beijing, Shanghai and other cultural sites.
This year will be dedicated to: more comprehensive training for our volunteer teachers (14 teachers this year in 35 different schools and programs); additional pedagogical training for permanent teachers in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Delaware and New Jersey in our upcoming training program in April 2010; a CI-Pitt system-wide assessment pro-gram to test our students beginning in January of 2010; and a CI-Pitt standardized curriculum for high school programs beginning in September of next year. Our programs have over 771 students taking Chinese in K-12 and college courses, adult learners and specialized programs. We also had approximately 5,500 people participate in Confucius Institute related events that ranged from the Dragon Boat festival, annual Chinese New Year’s Celebration, summer Chinese language camps for high school students and lectures and film series throughout the year.
