Students on the courses in Chinese are awarded grants to study in Beijing and Qufu

Four students from the Chinese courses offered by the Lifelong Learning Centre of the URV Foundation (FURV) through the URV’s Centre for Hispanic Studies travelled to China in summer to attend the Advanced Course in Chinese Culture, organised by the Confucius Institute Foundation and the University of Foreign Studies in Beijing. The students were awarded grants via the collaboration agreement between the Confucius Institute Foundation and the URV and were thus able to undertake cultural exchanges in Beijing and Qufu, the birthplace of Confucius.

One of the students, Manu Grao, who this year is studying level two of Chinese, stated that “spending time among native speakers and living in the same way as them is a very enriching experience”. Marta Novell, studying level three, described the “Understanding China” programme that they attended during July: “in the mornings, experts on each subject gave presentations on various aspects of Chinese society, culture and economy, and in the afternoons and at weekends we visited important sites with a local guide”.

In addition to Manu Grao and Marta Novell, grants were also awarded to Diego Gimeno and Gemma Reverté. All four shared classes and lived with students of Chinese from Poland, whose home institutes, like the URV, also have collaboration agreements with the Confucius Institute. The URV obtained four of the twenty grants on offer in Spain.

More and more people are interested in learning Chinese, as is the case for Manu Grao, who decided to study the language because of “China’s increasing importance on the world stage”. He also stated that he was pleased with his summer experience in China because it showed him that he could get by in the language.

Registration opens for Chinese courses at the URV

Registration for Chinese courses at the URV is open throughout October, when classes for the first four levels begin. Students who pass the course will obtain an HSK certificate accredited by the Confucius Institute Foundation, of which the URV is the only official examination centre in the province of Tarragona. There is also a 10% discount on the registration fee for members of the University community.

The FURV offers students on its Chinese courses the chance to form language tandems with Chinese students. In fact, the course teachers are native speakers who joined the URV after studying on the Spanish course offered by the URV to students from various universities in China and Taiwan.

For the first time it will also be possible to follow the courses online via the Great Wall Chinese programme offered by the Confucius Institute. The URV offers additional services to students from the Tarragona region registered for online courses, such as language tandems and face-to-face tutorials.

For more information, visit the website of the Centre for Hispanic Studies.