FOR a foreigner, learning how to read in Chinese sometimes feels like spot-the-difference: one of those children’s puzzles where you have to find tiny dissimilarities in two nearly identical pictures.[Read More …] Plant Earth Water

SEPTEMBER 10th is Teachers’ Day in China, an annual celebration of the contribution of educators. Inaugurated in 1985, it used to be a day for students to express thanks to school and university staff by making cards and giving flowers.[Read More …] Plant Earth Water

Don’t miss out on all of the fun at the 6th Annual UC ANR Education Expo on Saturday, September 27, 2014. Click on the link below to check out the schedule of events for the day. [Read More …] Plant Earth Water

AFTER a two-day trial last week, Ilham Tohti, a scholar who has spoken critically of China’s policies toward people of his Uighur ethnicity, was sentenced on September 23rd to life in prison for separatism.[Read More …] Plant Earth Water

THOUSANDS of students in Hong Kong are boycotting classes this week to lie on sprawling lawns outside government headquarters and discuss topics such as “post-totalitarianism” and George Orwell’s book “Animal Farm” (see their protest calendar, in Chinese, here).[Read More …] Plant Earth Water

THE Confucius Institutes programme, an ambitious soft-power effort by China to support education overseas, has been dealt a setback by one of its most prestigious American partners. On September 25th the University of Chicago announced it was “suspending” negotiations with Chinese officials to continue its Confucius Institute.[Read More …] Plant Earth Water

NEARLY 7m students began their courses at Chinese universities at the start of a new academic year this month. In line behind them, a new cohort is already cramming for next year’s university entrance-examination, the notorious gaokao.[Read More …] Plant Earth Water

IT IS a most unusual sight on Chinese soil, and most unsettling for leaders in Beijing.[Read More …] Plant Earth Water

Since late September demonstrators in Hong Kong have staged continuous street protests to press their demands for full democracy and the removal of the territory’s chief executive, Leung Chun-ying. On October 3rd tensions rose as residents opposed to the civil-disobedience campaign confronted the demonstrators.[Read More …] Plant Earth Water

THE number of pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong has shrunk from tens of thousands at the demonstrations’ peak to a few hundred scattered across three districts of the city, as people return to work and classes.[Read More …] Plant Earth Water