Seton Hall Students Present at International Conference  

On May 6, 2017, three graduate students and three undergraduate students from Seton Hall University presented at the Chinese Language Teacher’s Association of Greater New York’s 2017 Annual Conference held at SUNY’s campus in Manhattan. The graduate students were Qinghong Lin, Shangke Zhang, and Xiaolei Zhang and the undergraduates were Abigail Cordaro, Candy Fung, and Trevor West.

For the panel session on “U.S. College Students’ Study in China,” Abigail, Candy, and Trevor presented their research based on spending one month studying abroad in China. This study abroad program was led by Dr. Dongdong Chen, Chair of Seton Hall’s Languages, Literatures and Cultures Department. The summer program involved language and historical studies at Beijing University as well as a touring famous sites such as the Great Wall of China and the Terracotta Warriors site in Xi’an. The undergraduates addressed the topic “Is China’s Rising a Threat or an Opportunity to the US?” We each focused on different aspects including economic, military, or diplomatic factors and came to a consensus that, while China may present a direct threat to the U.S. in the next decade, there is ample evidence that China and the U.S. will maintain long-term peaceful relations.

The graduate students’ panel discussed their research involving Chinese language education. Qinghong Lin presented on “Designing Classroom Activities: Differences between College, Middle School and Kindergarten.” Shangke Zhang presented "Research on Mobile Chinese Learning Applications on Smart Phone-- Take Chinese Skill as an Example.” Xiaolei Zhang presented her research on “How Different Language Environments Influence the Process of Teaching Chinese: A Comparison between China and the US.” Qing Hong Lin said of the conference experience, “it was a valuable opportunity to interact with experienced Chinese language teachers, to ask them questions and to network with potential employment opportunities.”