The Confucius Institute, one of China's cultural gifts to the world, celebrates its 10th anniversary this year. Its influence is being felt not only in language learning but in fields as diverse as the arts and medicine

When delegates gathered in Cambridge, England, for the first annual national conference on Chinese teaching in schools in 2004, they could barely have foreseen how greatly Chinese-language learning would advance over the following 10 years.

Though China had begun opening up 15 years earlier and had joined the World Trade Organization in 2002, its trade with Europe was a mere tenth of what it is today.

At the same time, the study of Chinese was the pursuit of a very small minority, and with the European Union preparing to grow - 10 countries would join it in 2004 - French, German and other European languages continued to be the staple of second-language teaching in British schools.

"Only a very small number of schools in England was offering any kind of Chinese provision," says Katharine Carruthers, who attended the 2004 conference.

It marked "a turning point in the development of Chinese teaching in schools", says Carruthers, now director of the Institute of Education, part of the University of London.

That turning point owes much to events of the same year in the South Korean capital, Seoul, where China's National Office for Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language, also known as the Hanban, opened its first Confucius Institute, the first of what would eventually become hundreds worldwide. The Institute of Education was in the first wave, opening its first Confucius Institute in 2006.

The Institute of Education has since set up many programs with funding, teachers and other support from Hanban to create the largest network of such programs in Britain. Confucius Classrooms are a sister program aimed at secondary education.

The growth and increasing importance of Chinese language learning was illustrated, too, by this year's national Chinese conference in London this month, which drew a record 300 attendees and delegates, including the country's education minister, Elizabeth Truss.

After returning from a trip to China late last year, Prime Minister David Cameron, urged students to move away from French and German and start studying Mandarin.

"By the time the children born today leave school, China is set to be the world's largest economy," he said. "So it's time to look beyond the traditional focus on French and German and get many more children learning Mandarin." Cameron said he hoped the current number of Mandarin students would double to 400,000 by 2016.

Similarly, Scottish authorities said last year that they hoped the number of those competent in Mandarin in Scotland would double by 2017.

There are now 298 Confucius Institutes and Confucius Classrooms in 38 European countries. Britain, with 115 centers, has become the second-largest host country behind the United States, fueled in part by a large network of instructors and growing economic ties with China.

Enrollments in the Institute of Education's Confucius program, which covers 35 institutes and 440 classrooms, rose from 5,942 in 2011 to 8,364 last year.

"There has been considerable growth in Mandarin study as awareness of Chinese culture has grown alongside China's importance as an economic powerhouse," Carruthers says.

"Students find Chinese language interesting, and they enjoy learning about a different culture, and the ability to speak Chinese can lead to greater prospects for jobs. We want to see Chinese on the curriculum in schools, alongside European languages."

The Confucius Institute, often compared with the British Council, the Goethe-Institut of Germany, Alliance Francaise of France and the Cervantes Institute of Spain, most of which have been around for many decades, is a relative newcomer in the realm of cultural associations.

Alliance Francaise, founded in 1888, has 1,040 establishments in 136 countries, while the British Council, founded in 1934, has 200 offices in 100 countries.

The Confucius Institute, which will celebrate its 10th anniversary in September, has more than 440 branches and 640 classrooms worldwide, and it aims to have 1,000 by 2020. By 2011, China had spent more than $500 million (369 million euros) on the Confucius Institute programs.

The institute's modus operandi differs considerably from its European counterparts in that it sets up offices on university campuses, connecting students to China and its academic institutions. While that strategy seems to be working like a dream, if the growth figures are anything to go by, it creates at least one problem: finding qualified teachers to lead its programs.

Chinese universities that are partners with the Confucius Institute usually supply directors and teachers, but some of those universities may have partnerships with three or more Confucius Institutes.

As the organization expands, it is broadening beyond being simply a provider of language instruction.

At Goldsmith Dance College Confucius Institute in London, language learning plays a secondary role. That institute, opened two years ago, is, like the Institute of Education, part of the University of London, and is the first Confucius Institute anywhere to specialize in bringing Chinese dance and performance arts to its host university.

"Through introducing students to the arts of China and through raising awareness of Chinese culture, we have created an opportunity for students to gain a better understanding of China," says Ann Guo, director of Goldsmith Dance College Confucius Institute.

"We offer a varied range of courses such as Chinese dance, music, martial arts, taichi and cultural awareness training to enable a greater exposure to the Chinese culture and heritage.

"Due to Goldsmith's strengths in the arts and humanities, this was a beneficial match to the advantage of both Goldsmith and Hanban UK."

More than 600 students are enrolled in programs at Goldsmith, and it plans to expand courses available by next year, she says.

The college now offers a Bachelor of Arts in International Studies and Chinese, and plans to extend its Confucius Institute operations to take in four separate degree courses at the university.

Beyond the college classroom, Guo says, a goal for the center is to spread the joy of Chinese culture through music, dance and taichi beyond the campus and into the community.

Goldsmith has created a teacher training program that will help establish a foundation so more teachers, outside the realm of Confucius Institutes, can propagate Chinese culture throughout Britain.

"With the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing, we have created a teacher training program," Guo says. "We are the first organization to professionally offer this teacher training program of Chinese dance in the UK, which will offer collaborative benefits to Goldsmith as well as benefiting the local community."

In a similar first, London Southbank University opened a Confucius Institute for traditional Chinese medicine in 2009. It was the first such course in a Confucius Institute, and is offered in conjunction with Heilongjiang University of Chinese Medicine and Harbin Normal University.

There are now more than a half a dozen Confucius Institutes in Europe and the US that specialize in traditional Chinese medicine.

In addition to its role as an educator, the Confucius Institute has become a business mediator through which research and exchanges with Chinese companies and other businesses can be arranged.

At the Confucius Institute of University College Dublin, opened in 2006 the first in Ireland, research plays a large part in helping local businesses better understand China.

"One of the key objectives of the institutes is to develop an international research profile in Chinese studies and to facilitate the development of economic and cultural links between Ireland and China," says professor Wang Liming, assistant to the president and director of the Dublin institute.

"To that end the institutes have supported three survey research projects which aim to identify the needs and demand of Irish business, university students and post-primary school students for Chinese studies and help Irish higher education to take up the challenge of meeting the increasingly higher demand."

They have since helped connect almost a dozen local Irish businesses with China.

The university began building Confucius Institute premises covering 2,000 square meters this month. The university plans to use the center to bolster research and language instruction, and include with it a new executive training program.

Even as European schools reap the benefits of the Confucius Institute's language instruction, the institutes are helping improve China's own education system.

At Suzhou Industrial Park in Suzhou, in Jiangsu province, Xi'an Jiao Tong University collaborated with the University of Liverpool to create a joint-venture school in 2006.

The university, with more than 7,000 students and a 527 million yuan ($84 million; 62 million euros) learning center opened in 2011, hopes to become one of the premier universities in China.

"All classes are taught in English and recruitment is from the top half of the highest band of gaokao (the university entrance exam), so admission standards are equal to the very best Chinese universities," says Ann Smith, deputy director of the Confucius Institute at Liverpool University.

The university hopes to double the number of Chinese students enrolled to 15,000 by 2017, Smith says.

In Britain, the Liverpool Confucius Institute is used as a community center and a way to help Chinese students adapt to university life in the West.

Liverpool University is surrounded by one of the oldest Chinese communities in Britain, dating back more than 120 years. A Liverpool City Council member serves on the local Confucius Institute board.

The institute frequently hosts community events, most notably Chinese New Year celebrations.

Smith says: "Liverpool's Confucius Institute also addresses the issue of integrating its Chinese students by organizing conversation exchange events, which pair native British speakers with Chinese students to their mutual benefit, enabling them to improve their language skills and share social and cultural experiences."

While a Confucius Institute's program is often defined by the institute's connection with a higher education institution, the institute acts more like a traditional cultural center when host universities are unavailable.

The Confucius Institute of Hanover, Germany, for example, joined the Chinese Center of Hanover instead of the local university.

"At the time, when the Chinese government decided to establish the Confucius Institutes, there was no university in Lower Saxony with a Sinology/Chinese studies department," says Bettina Greiss, director of the Confucius Institute of Hanover.

"But since the Chinese Center of Hanover had already assumed tasks which were later declared as core business of the Confucius Institute, such as language courses and cultural events, it was negotiated that the Confucius Institutes for the area of Lower Saxony should be launched within the Chinese Center."

The institute is run from a small office with few staff, which puts it at a disadvantage to institutes attached to universities, which can not only draw on the universities' physical resources, but also have a highly accessible market in the university's students.

Griess says that has forced the institute to be more aggressive in connecting with the community.

"It compels us to go out, which again we see as an advantage."

In many cases, that has pushed the center to expand its reach beyond just one student body connecting several universities and cultural institutions in the region to host events and language instruction.

"This way we reach and encourage people of different ages and backgrounds to study Chinese," she says.

"Our activities are not limited by the focus of a partner university, but we expand them to the whole state of Lower Saxony and even to neighboring Saxony-Anhalt."

With less emphasis on helping the university establish a Chinese-language curriculum, cultural activities often trump the center's other tasks, which Griess says is crucial in helping people of all ages understand China.

"To improve the mutual understanding of different cultures, it's not enough to just teach the correct vocabulary. You have to explain specific cultural characteristics and point out cultural differences as well. So I would declare language teaching and cultural teaching as equal parts of the Confucius Institute's mission."

toddbalazovic@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 06/20/2014 page16)