Representatives of Pontifical University of Salamanca, Spain Visit SCBC
Representatives from the University of the Pontifical University of Salamanca (UPSA) visited SCBC on March 14th. Zhili Lai, the executive vice president of SCBC, received the visitors Benito Marin Serrano, Director of Office of International Exchange and Ma Isabel Del Arco Gomez, Head of Department of Spanish Language and Culture.
Benito Marin Serrano first briefed the profile of the Pontifical University of Salamanca. The university (La Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca in Spanish) was established in 1940 as a Catholic private university chartered by Spanish government. UPSA is highly renowned all over the world as well as in Spain, being well experienced in its instruction with a strong team of faculty, rigorous in building its school ethos, rich in its tremendous academic achievements, and reputedly for its pure Spanish language learning environment and excellent location. Besides, UPSA's accreditation is officially acknowledged by Chinese Ministry of Education.
Zhili Lai then introduced the basic situation of SCBC. He said, SCBC is committed to train both application-oriented and creative talents. It has set up disciplines mainly in foreign languages and business management. With its distinctive strength in foreign language studies, it currently offers 11 foreign language majors. Next to English, Spanish is the second largest foreign language specialty that enrolls 90 to 100 Spanish language majors each year and also teaches some non-Spanish majors minoring in Spanish as a second foreign language. The school actively carries out cooperation and exchanges with foreign universities so as to encourage SCBC students to learn a foreign language in the native tongue country.
Afterward, both sides exchanged ideas and discussed the collaboration in further detail.
22 Foreign Students Arrived in SCBC for Exchange Studies
22 tuition-waived students from cooperation colleges of Spain, Mexico and South Korea have arrived for their exchange programs of this semester. All of them are Chinese language learning students. Among these colleges, the Spanish Public University of Navarra and the Mexican University of Zelaya sent their students of exchange program for the first time.
The first week of the semester was scheduled for the foreign students to register, during which SCBC invited them to a welcome dinner party. From the second week on, they are to take their courses. In regard to the curriculum design, due to the difference in their Chinese proficiency and program duration, they have been divided into two small classes, Foreign Student Class I and II, for the core courses. Meanwhile, these students will take some Business English courses offered in the English by English Department and some Chinese courses offered by the Chinese Department as their elective courses.
To carry forward the Chinese culture and facilitate the students to experience the essence of Chinese culture, SCBC offers a "Chinese Culture Experiences" course, which encompasses Chinese folk music, Chinese calligraphy, Chinese painting and Chinese culinary culture. Besides, students of these programs will be arranged to the field trips and tours in the “Garden of Lingnan Culture Impression” and other Guangzhou attractions, which are intended to help them understand Chinese culture through architecture styles and other cultural features, hence be involved in school life soon.