Thirty volunteers from Hubei province as Chinese teachers in Thailand returned to China successfully in spite of unstable Thai political situation.
Thirty volunteer Chinese teachers from Huzhong University of Science and Technology HUST returned to Wuhan successfully on 17 March. This is the third time that HUST received the "Volunteer Chinese Teacher Program" mission to Thailand from Hubei Provincial Department of Education and the Office of Chinese Language Council International since 2007.
Last year, 30 students from HUST went to Thailand as volunteer Chinese teachers. After more than 10 months' teaching and living in Thailand, only several days before the HUST students' returning to China, tens of thousands of anti-government red-shirted demonstrators had swarmed Bangkok. In spite of the unstable political situation, they did not quit but keep teaching to the last minute and then returned home safely.
Among 1,018 volunteer teachers in Thailand, two students from HUST won the Excellent Volunteer Teacher Award from Thai Ministry of Education. It is the first time HUST students have ever been granted such an honor in the past three years. At the same time, 12 from the 30 students are selected to continue their teaching in Thailand next year. It is also the largest number of renewable volunteer teachers since 2007.
With a bachelor's degree in Teaching Chinese to foreigners from the School of Humanities, Qian Yuqiong is the head of the Hubei volunteer Chinese teachers. After months of efforts, one of her students won the first prize in Bangkok Chinese contest. As a result of hard work and outstanding achievement, Qian Yuqiong was awarded the Excellent Volunteer Teacher by Thailand Ministry of Education.
Hu Zihua also won the Excellent Volunteer Teacher Award. With a bachelor's degree in Chinese Language and Literature from the School of Humanities, he bore the most hardships in the past 10 months. When he came to the Thai school in the beginning, his dorm was only a four square meter stair hall without window screen and bed. He had to fight a good while with mosquitoes every night. However he never lost patience and enjoyed his work very much. He will continue his Chinese teaching in the same school for another one year.
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Background information
In order to meet new trends in Chinese language learning around the world and address the shortage of Chinese language teachers in foreign countries, the Office of Chinese Language Council International Hanban , under the authorization of Chinese Ministry of Education, has implemented the "Volunteer Chinese Teacher Program". This program has been operational since 2004, and in 2006 Hanban formulated the "Overseas Volunteer Chinese Teacher Program". The Volunteer Center at Hanban is in charge of planning, organizing and coordinating the program, including all its daily operations. So far, Hanban has sent nearly 8,000 volunteer Chinese language teachers to 68 countries. HUST has sent 94 volunteer Chinese teachers to Thailand from 2007 to 2009.
