ESOL certified and taught English for a year. One thing led to another and I ended up in China in 2006, where I’ve been since. I’ve continued teaching English and I’ve also been involved in teacher training.
I hit the ground running with my Chinese studies and achieved a decent conversational level within my first year. I took the HSK for the first time in 2009 and got a 5. I took it again in 2010 and got a 7. Looking back, this is actually very slow progress. Really until 2009 I didn’t do much character study or serious reading. It wasn’t until I committed to the idea of graduate school (2009) that I got serious about characters and reading.
Currently, I’m on track to complete my MA in 2014. I hope that in the process I can get some papers published, perhaps give some talks at some conferences (my adviser seems to think having a foreigner speak at some of the conventions he attends would be quite novel), and then move on to do my PhD in the States. I’m majoring in Ancient Chinese History with an emphasis on the Ming and Qing dynasties.
I first heard about the CSC scholarship here on Chinese Forums. I looked into it and decided to apply. The process was quick and easy. I applied from the mainland via the Chinese Embassy in Washington, D.C.
At the time when I submitted my application, I was only interested in one school, Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT). I had done some preliminary research online and through CUCAS. While CUCAS wasn’t incredibly helpful, I was able to find enough information between them and HIT’s website to make an informed decision (or so I thought). In the end, I switched schools after HIT informed me they did not have my major. The CSC offices in DC were helpful and prompt in telling me how to change my already-submitted application and filing the new papers.
The CSC contacts at the university have been helpful. I’ve been provided with everything promised. The only weird thing is that the scholarship only covers “necessary” books. Perhaps this is different for BA students, but as an MA student none of my books are considered “necessary”. Luckily, all but one of the books I “needed” this first semester was available in electronic format.
This is a lengthy aside which I’m providing as an anecdote to attest to the overall disorganization of some institutions. If you’re applying to a university which has established systems for foreign students, it’s unlikely you’ll encounter this type of situation. However, if you’re applying to universities which do not have many foreigners, you’re likely to encounter some level of chaos.
I had read on HIT’s English website (I found their Chinese website very unhelpful) that they did indeed have a modern and contemporary history MA program. I also verified this through CUCAS which supposedly contacted a professor there.
I wanted to speak directly with a professor at HIT prior to applying to get a feel for the course content, textbooks used (so that I could start reading ahead), class schedule, etc. (this is quite normal for students to do in the States). In the end, I was unable to do so as the contact information I found online lead nowhere, and the professors I attempted to contact did not reply.
Despite this, I decided to apply anyway. As the CSC deadline was approaching, I tracked down the person in charge of foreign affairs and asked how to apply. I filled out a form, submitted the materials requested (scan of my passport, transcripts, notarized copy of my BA, etc.), and was told I’d be contacted after everything was processed.
Within about a week I was contacted by a professor. She wanted to schedule a meeting to meet with me and let me take an exam to assess my subject knowledge. (Apparently the other students applying for this program had just completed the official 考研 exam, so I was behind the gun.) I arrived about 10 minutes early for the meeting (to make sure I could find the office). The professor was about 15 minutes late. She explained she had written a special exam for me which I could complete using the computer. She had literally scribbled five questions on a napkin. I waited in her office while she typed them up and printed them out. While I don’t recall the exact questions, they were all essay-format questions asking to recall events post-1840. She gave me the exam to complete and then left the office. After I finished the exam I waited around for a bit until a graduate student came and told me the professor wouldn’t return. I handed my answers to a graduate student and left.
A few days later the same professor contacted me. She informed me that not only did HIT not have a modern and contemporary history major (which I had not only just applied for, but also took an exam for), but they didn’t even have a history department, which, apparently, the university had just closed.
I was told that I should instead study Marxism, because (and this is verbatim) “modern history and Marxism are the same”. I was told that I had passed the exam, and that I was invited to attend an interview with the graduate committee. By this stage, even though I was certain I would not accept an offer with this university, I figured since I had come this far, I might as well attend for the experience.
There were seven other students attending the interview. After speaking with a few of them, I learned that not all of them were history majors as undergraduates. One of them didn’t even know what major he was interviewing for (he thought it was for philosophy). Also, upon speaking with some of the current graduate students who were supervising the interview, I learned that even though many of them were about a semester away from graduating, they hadn’t even started their dissertation research; some hadn’t even chosen a topic, and some seemed as though they were just planning on writing a book report.
I was the last of the students to be interviewed. While those before me took about 20 minutes each, mine was done in less than five. I was asked if I knew who Bertrand Russell was. I was also asked if I didn’t receive the CSC scholarship if I’d entertain self-funding. I said no because I was neither interested in studying Marxism nor paying the enormous sum of 50,000 RMB for two years’ tuition.
Several weeks after the interview, I was contacted by the admissions office informing me I had been accepted. In that time, I had already been accepted to Heilongjiang University, which, so far, has been a much more positive experience than what I experienced at HIT.
I received my CSC acceptance package mid-summer. I knew ahead of this I had already been accepted as I contacted the university directly.
During the first few days of the semester (note, after the Chinese students had already begun their classes) foreign students began registering—this is relevant because my major classes began the day we were asked to come in to register. (In the end it I only ended up missing one class.) CSC students had different meeting times assigned from the other foreign students (e.g. those who were self-funded or on a different scholarship).
Though I met with the academic coordinator for foreign students early and explained to her my situation (i.e. that I had my own apartment, had my visa covered through my employer, etc.), she said I still needed to attend the meetings. However, the meetings were only catered to addressing these issues and making these arrangements (e.g. visa, dorm, etc.), so they were not beneficial at all for me. There have been several other “mandatory” meetings throughout this last semester, none of which I’ve attended as they’ve all been scheduled only a day in advance (so I had no time to rearrange my schedule), and even at times when I had class.
All foreign students are required to take a Chinese proficiency test. This seemed a bit odd as one prerequisite for getting into non-Chinese language majors is at least a 6 on the HSK. It was later, when I overheard the admissions coordinator speaking with other students, that I discovered students who failed the exam were required to take additional Chinese language classes at their own expense. While it’s good that the university doesn’t want to place students with a low level in a class in which they’ll clearly struggle, the whole set up seemed more like a money-making opportunity for the university than a measure designed to group students according to their level of fluency.
A clear case of this can be found in the only other foreign student in my class (we’re both studying the same major)—a Japanese student in his mid-to-late twenties. He speaks very poorly with no fluency and he has a very difficult time following along in lectures. He’s often asked questions by the professors (because they call on everyone equally) and he is rarely able to respond. Sometimes he just shakes his head. When he must communicate with either the professors or our classmates, he makes everyone write down what they want to say; he also responds by writing.
In light of this situation, and also my experienced with HIT's application process, it seems quite obvious that foreign students get much more leeway with admissions criteria than Chinese. Perhaps this is because having a larger foreign student body adds prestige to the university?
After several days of going back and forth to the university, I was informed by the admissions office that they also no longer had a contemporary and modern history major. This time, however, I was given many more options than just “Marxism”. The period closest to what