n fall 2017, as a sophomore in college, I studied abroad at Nanjing University in China. There I quickly discovered the Hopkins–Nanjing Center (HNC) and envisioned the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) as my graduate school.
I arrived at the HNC last September.
The HNC, a partnership between Johns Hopkins and Nanjing University and one of three SAIS global campuses, opened in 1986 as the first U.S.–China contemporary educational joint venture. An original vision of the HNC attracted me to the program: that one day the U.S. secretary of state and the Chinese minister of foreign affairs would meet and realize they are both HNC alumni.
The main pillar of the HNC is academic freedom. In this rare space in China, international and Chinese students are taught by international and Chinese professors on many sensitive topics, including Chinese government, society, and U.S.–China relations. This often leads to discussion, disagreements, and debate inside and outside the classroom. The program exists to foster these conversations.
Right now, this educational spirit is heavily one–sided. China’s students are determined to understand America by going there to study, while American students and the U.S. government are not reciprocating.
According to the Institute of International Education, in the 2022–2023 school year there were just under 300,000 Chinese higher–education students studying in America. That is down from a peak of over 370,000 in 2019–2020, yet China remains the largest source of international students in the U.S. education system.
By contrast, it has been reported that there are roughly 350 American students currently studying in China, down from 11,639 in the 2018–2019 school year and its peak of just under 15,000 in 2011–2012. Much of this drop has to do with the pandemic preventing study in China, but also deteriorating relations have kept American students away.
What is the best method to increase this number? The U.S. should begin sending students to China again through programs like Fulbright, Peace Corps, and the Boren Awards, which have all been closed to China within the past four years.
In fall 2022, I applied for the Boren Fellowship, a U.S. government–funded graduate fellowship that supports up to one year of overseas study in exchange for a commitment to federal service upon graduation. In April 2023, I received my acceptance letter. Elated, I jumped up, gave my roommate a bear hug, and threw fists in the air. Then I went back and continued reading: The Boren Awards had decided it would not fund students’ programs in China and would only fund programs in Taiwan.
Still, I believe in the value of studying China in China, so I turned down the Boren Fellowship and came to study China on my own. Since arriving in China, I have met several others in my situation.
Peace Corps volunteers in China received notice in January 2020 that all programs in China were shutting down. President Trump terminated the China and Hong Kong Fulbright programs on July 14, 2020 via executive order as a response to the Hong Kong national security law that broadly eroded Hong Kong’s independence. These moves were politically charged, short–sighted, and aimed at worsening U.S.–China relations. These programs have been questioned before as a wasteful use of taxpayer dollars, yet they have received bipartisan funding for decades. Shutting these programs down did not set back the Chinese government, but it did constrain American students, would–be China experts, and U.S. national security interests.
Why should the U.S. reinstate these programs and increase the number of American students studying in China? Firstly, these programs create the next generation of China experts. One of the best ways to create experts on relations with a country is to have future experts study in that country. This is ultimately in the interest of American national security. In June 2023, U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns said that cultivating the U.S. government’s “next generation of China experts” requires increasing the number of U.S. students in China. It is crucial that the U.S. continue to produce more China experts to contribute to the defining bilateral relationship of this century. We need more Americans who know China, not less. American students who study Chinaoften become the go–to China experts in the public and private sectors, and in–country experience is invaluable to the contextual understanding they need.
Secondly, the U.S. should reimplement these programs to improve U.S.–China relations. There is a bill to bring back the Fulbright program, but it has been sitting in the House Committee on Foreign Affairs for almost a year with three cosponsors. The appetite in Congress to support programs like these is admittedly at an all–time low, mirroring the most serious strain in U.S.–China relations in decades. Much of this deterioration is driven by the actions of the Chinese government that directly contradict U.S. values. One should not discount the importance of these serious issues in our bilateral relationship, but to make progress, there must be open, continuing conversation and action.
At President Biden’s meeting with President Xi on the sidelines of APEC in November 2023, they agreed to reopen military lines of communication. It is unhelpful that the connection broke in the first place, though these communication links, like educational exchange, are tools of crafting international relations. Educational exchange should be a foundation of diplomacy because it builds up present and future mutual understanding between two nations. Given the array of tools to address China’s actions, severing educational ties is unnecessary self–sabotage for U.S. national security interests and impedes improving relations.
These programs also help improve relations in the day–to–day lives of citizens. For many Chinese, the first American they met was in one of these programs. Participants become pseudo–ambassadors for America, sharing our values and views with Chinese who otherwise might never have heard directly from an American.
Ultimately, suspending the Fulbright, Peace Corps, and Boren Awards for Americans in China harms, rather than protects, national security and the future of U.S.–China relations. A crucial step in improving and preparing for the future of U.S.–China relations is to reestablish these government–funded grants. This way, future public servants will be able to more accurately understand, interact with, and create policy on China.
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To improve U.S.–China relations, restore severed scholarship programs
Night view of Nanjing, China, which is home to one of China's oldest universities. Image by Daniel_Xiang from Pixabay
January 31, 2024
Nearly 300,000 Chinese higher–education students studied in the U.S. during the 2022–2023 school year , while only around 350 U.S. students studied in China. Closing this gap will be key to improving U.S.–China relations in the long–term, writes Sam Trizza.
I
n fall 2017, as a sophomore in college, I studied abroad at Nanjing University in China. There I quickly discovered the Hopkins–Nanjing Center (HNC) and envisioned the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) as my graduate school.
I arrived at the HNC last September.
The HNC, a partnership between Johns Hopkins and Nanjing University and one of three SAIS global campuses, opened in 1986 as the first U.S.–China contemporary educational joint venture. An original vision of the HNC attracted me to the program: that one day the U.S. secretary of state and the Chinese minister of foreign affairs would meet and realize they are both HNC alumni.
The main pillar of the HNC is academic freedom. In this rare space in China, international and Chinese students are taught by international and Chinese professors on many sensitive topics, including Chinese government, society, and U.S.–China relations. This often leads to discussion, disagreements, and debate inside and outside the classroom. The program exists to foster these conversations.
Right now, this educational spirit is heavily one–sided. China’s students are determined to understand America by going there to study, while American students and the U.S. government are not reciprocating.
According to the Institute of International Education, in the 2022–2023 school year there were just under 300,000 Chinese higher–education students studying in America. That is down from a peak of over 370,000 in 2019–2020, yet China remains the largest source of international students in the U.S. education system.
By contrast, it has been reported that there are roughly 350 American students currently studying in China, down from 11,639 in the 2018–2019 school year and its peak of just under 15,000 in 2011–2012. Much of this drop has to do with the pandemic preventing study in China, but also deteriorating relations have kept American students away.
What is the best method to increase this number? The U.S. should begin sending students to China again through programs like Fulbright, Peace Corps, and the Boren Awards, which have all been closed to China within the past four years.
In fall 2022, I applied for the Boren Fellowship, a U.S. government–funded graduate fellowship that supports up to one year of overseas study in exchange for a commitment to federal service upon graduation. In April 2023, I received my acceptance letter. Elated, I jumped up, gave my roommate a bear hug, and threw fists in the air. Then I went back and continued reading: The Boren Awards had decided it would not fund students’ programs in China and would only fund programs in Taiwan.
Still, I believe in the value of studying China in China, so I turned down the Boren Fellowship and came to study China on my own. Since arriving in China, I have met several others in my situation.
Peace Corps volunteers in China received notice in January 2020 that all programs in China were shutting down. President Trump terminated the China and Hong Kong Fulbright programs on July 14, 2020 via executive order as a response to the Hong Kong national security law that broadly eroded Hong Kong’s independence. These moves were politically charged, short–sighted, and aimed at worsening U.S.–China relations. These programs have been questioned before as a wasteful use of taxpayer dollars, yet they have received bipartisan funding for decades. Shutting these programs down did not set back the Chinese government, but it did constrain American students, would–be China experts, and U.S. national security interests.
Why should the U.S. reinstate these programs and increase the number of American students studying in China? Firstly, these programs create the next generation of China experts. One of the best ways to create experts on relations with a country is to have future experts study in that country. This is ultimately in the interest of American national security. In June 2023, U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns said that cultivating the U.S. government’s “next generation of China experts” requires increasing the number of U.S. students in China. It is crucial that the U.S. continue to produce more China experts to contribute to the defining bilateral relationship of this century. We need more Americans who know China, not less. American students who study Chinaoften become the go–to China experts in the public and private sectors, and in–country experience is invaluable to the contextual understanding they need.
Secondly, the U.S. should reimplement these programs to improve U.S.–China relations. There is a bill to bring back the Fulbright program, but it has been sitting in the House Committee on Foreign Affairs for almost a year with three cosponsors. The appetite in Congress to support programs like these is admittedly at an all–time low, mirroring the most serious strain in U.S.–China relations in decades. Much of this deterioration is driven by the actions of the Chinese government that directly contradict U.S. values. One should not discount the importance of these serious issues in our bilateral relationship, but to make progress, there must be open, continuing conversation and action.
At President Biden’s meeting with President Xi on the sidelines of APEC in November 2023, they agreed to reopen military lines of communication. It is unhelpful that the connection broke in the first place, though these communication links, like educational exchange, are tools of crafting international relations. Educational exchange should be a foundation of diplomacy because it builds up present and future mutual understanding between two nations. Given the array of tools to address China’s actions, severing educational ties is unnecessary self–sabotage for U.S. national security interests and impedes improving relations.
These programs also help improve relations in the day–to–day lives of citizens. For many Chinese, the first American they met was in one of these programs. Participants become pseudo–ambassadors for America, sharing our values and views with Chinese who otherwise might never have heard directly from an American.
Ultimately, suspending the Fulbright, Peace Corps, and Boren Awards for Americans in China harms, rather than protects, national security and the future of U.S.–China relations. A crucial step in improving and preparing for the future of U.S.–China relations is to reestablish these government–funded grants. This way, future public servants will be able to more accurately understand, interact with, and create policy on China.
