Education, China, and Politics

With China soon to be the superpower of economics, language programs in public schools are focusing on Mandarin have already started in Chicago, Philadelphia, Houston, and Boston.

In the U.S. Senate, the Foreign Relations Committee is considering a proposal to allocate $1.3 billion to boost Chinese language and culture classes in public school, and China, too, is doing its part, said Michael Levine, education director at The Asia Society in New York City. China's education ministry has formed partnerships with states including Kentucky and Kansas, as well as the countries of Brazil, Australia and the United Kingdom, to boost teacher exchanges and training.

Kansas says that its not fair to ignore the new world influence and were eager to add Chinese to their offerings. As pointed out:

Those who believe teaching Chinese is important point out that trade between the U.S. and China is growing. U.S. trade with China exceeded $230 billion last year, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, trailing only Canada and Mexico. It's difficult to learn. To read Chinese, one must know thousands of characters, because the language does not have an alphabet. And when speaking Chinese, tone can determine meaning. For example, "ask" and "kiss" are pronounced the same in Chinese but are differentiated by tones. But Low's students said knowing the language will give them an advantage when they apply to college or begin their careers.

While I have not check out all of these resources, for those that do not want to wait for their public schools, take a look at some of these online resources.