双语阅读 |​ 中国留学生重新上路

ethan.wu

The West's allure
西方的诱惑

China’s globetrotting students are getting back on the road
中国留学生重新上路

But Western universities worry that their numbers may dwindle
但西方大学担心他们的人数可能将减少

QIN YIBO is half way through a science degree at the University of Auckland in New Zealand. But she has not been in the country since early 2020 when it closed its borders to prevent the spread of covid-19 (she was back in China at the time). Instead the university has arranged for Ms Qin and other stranded students in China to take up residence on campuses in their own country while they continue their studies remotely. Ms Qin has thought about transferring permanently to a Chinese university, but she still plans to return to New Zealand when it eases its border controls.
秦艺波（音译）在新西兰的奥克兰大学（University of Auckland）攻读理科学位，目前学业已经过半。但自2020年初新西兰关闭边境以防新冠疫情传播以来（当时她已返回中国），她就一直没有再回到新西兰。该校安排秦艺波和其他受疫情影响滞留中国的学生迁入在中国的合作院校，通过远程授课继续学习。她曾考虑永久转到一所中国大学，但目前仍计划在新西兰放松边境管制后返校。

Ms Qin is relatively lucky. She has enjoyed seeing parts of her country that she had not visited previously. She spent the early months of this year at a university in Heilongjiang, a north-eastern province with bitter winters. Then, for a change of scenery, she moved to a campus in Fujian in the balmy south. Many thousands of Chinese students who had not yet enrolled at universities abroad when the pandemic began have found their plans upended by covid-related travel restrictions. Universities in the West have lived in fear that young Chinese, whose tuition fees are a lucrative source of revenue, would give up the dream of studying abroad.
秦艺波还算是幸运的。她还有机会去国内一些自己没去过的地方看看。今年头几个月她在东北部省份黑龙江的一所大学里，那里的冬天异常寒冷。后来，为了换换环境，她又搬到位于温暖宜人的南方省份福建的一个校园。疫情爆发时几十万名中国学生尚未在海外大学入学，他们的留学计划被接下来的疫情相关旅行限制彻底打乱。中国学生支付的大笔学费是西方大学的一大收入来源，校方一直非常担心中国的年轻人会因此放弃出国留学的梦想。

There are good reasons for Western universities to be anxious. In 2019 around 700,000 Chinese headed abroad to study, more than three times the number a decade earlier. Most joined universities in English-speaking countries. Chinese students have had several reasons to reconsider their destinations. Foreign travel is difficult during a pandemic, and covid is still rife in Western countries. China has grown more unpopular in recent years, and some Chinese people in the West have suffered racist abuse. Anti-Western sentiment has also been rising in China, sometimes stoked by ruling-party propaganda. Many Chinese chafe at Westerners who blame China for its initial cover-up of covid, or who fail to give it credit for its subsequent success in curbing the virus.
西方院校有充分的理由感到焦虑。2019年，约有70万中国人出国留学，是十年前的三倍多。大多数人都选择了英语国家的大学。但现在，中国学生要重新考虑出国目的地了，原因有几个。首先，大流行病期间出国旅行会变得困难，而新冠疫情仍在西方国家肆虐。近年来，中国变得越来越不受欢迎，而一些在西方的中国人遭到了种族主义欺凌。中国的反西方情绪也在升温，有时是受到执政党宣传机器的煽动。许多中国人不满西方人指责中国在最初隐瞒疫情或者不称颂它后来在遏制病毒上的成功。

But the pandemic’s impact on Chinese demand for study abroad has not been as bad as many had predicted. Before the crisis about 370,000 Chinese were studying at American universities, where they made up about a third of foreign students. In 2020 the number of Chinese enrolled, including those studying online from abroad, fell by around 15%. That is not the collapse that some in the industry had predicted, says Martin McFarlane of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The fall was caused almost entirely by a reduction in the number of foreign students starting new courses, which now seems to be rebounding. The Institute of International Education, an American NGO, says that this autumn the number of foreigners who began studying at American universities for the first time was only 9% lower than in 2019 (though about 35% were taking their classes online).
但是，疫情对中国留学需求的影响并没有预想的那么严重。疫情爆发前，大概有37万中国人在美国大学求学，约占美国国际学生总数的三分之一。2020年，包括在美国以外地点上网课的学生在内，中国在读留学生人数下降了15%左右。伊利诺伊大学厄巴纳-香槟分校的马丁·麦克法兰（Martin McFarlane）表示，这并不是一些业内人士所预测的暴跌。这一降幅几乎完全源自新入学的外国学生人数的减少，而这部分现在似乎正在回升。美国非政府组织国际教育协会（Institute of International Education）表示，今年秋季，美国大学新入学的外国学生人数仅比2019年减少9%（尽管约35%的人是上网课，网课代修平台：www.meeloun.com）。

Australia has kept its borders shut to most foreign students throughout the pandemic. Even now, roughly half of them are studying online from outside the country, including about 65% of those from China. Yet, in Australia, total Chinese enrolment in higher education has fallen only 7%. Chinese students—nervous of the virus but keen to burnish their CVs with a Western degree—have proven more willing to put up with online learning than peers of other nationalities. Enrolments by Indians, for whom in-person classes are a high priority, have fallen by more than a third.
疫情期间，澳大利亚一直对大多数外国学生关闭边境。即使是现在，其国际学生当中仍有约一半从澳大利亚以外的地点远程上网课，其中约65%来自中国。不过，在澳大利亚高等院校求学的中国学生总数仅下降了7%。中国学生害怕病毒，但又渴望用西方的学位给简历镶金。结果是他们比其他国家的学生更愿意忍受上网课。印度人非常看重面对面教学，他们的在读人数下降了超过三分之一。

Britain’s universities have fared the best. The number of Chinese students was rising fast in the years leading up to the pandemic. This summer the country began allowing foreigners to remain longer after graduation to work or look for a job. Britain’s rules on post-study employment are now among the most permissive in the West. Since the pandemic began, Britain’s borders have stayed mostly open to foreign students, as long as they are willing to endure quarantine. In 2020 the number of Chinese accepted for undergraduate studies increased by 30%. This year the number of Chinese applying to start undergraduate courses rose again, by 17%.
英国的大学状况最好。在疫情爆发前的几年里，中国留学生的数量迅速增加。今年夏天，英国开始允许外国人在毕业后居留更长时间工作或求职。英国对毕业后的就业规定是西方国家中最宽松之一。疫情发生以来，只要外国学生愿意忍受隔离，英国的边境基本上对他们保持开放。2020年，本科录取的中国学生人数增加了30%。今年，申请本科课程的中国学生数量再次增加，上升了17%。

In some countries, Chinese demand for tertiary education may yet falter. America is likely to remain the single most-popular destination for several more years. It is still widely regarded in China as having the largest number of great universities. But some Chinese have been put off studying in America by the xenophobic rhetoric of American officials during Donald Trump’s presidency, which fuelled perceptions of Chinese as potential spies. Such concerns may have abated a bit since Joe Biden took over. But surveys of Chinese considering study in America have shown that they view America’s handling of covid as the worst in the English-speaking world. Chinese students show growing interest in studying in Asia, says Simon Emmett of IDP, a multinational agency that helps universities recruit them. Asian countries are deemed to have a better record with covid.
在其他一些国家，来自中国的高等教育需求可能会下降。未来几年里，美国很可能仍是最受欢迎的留学目的地。中国人仍然普遍认为美国拥有最多的优秀大学。但在特朗普执政期间，美国官员的排外言论助长了将中国人视为潜在间谍的观念，一些中国人因此对赴美留学望而却步。自拜登上台以来，这种担忧可能有所缓和。但对有意赴美留学的中国人的调查显示，他们认为美国的防疫表现是英语国家中最差的。帮助大学招收中国学生的跨国机构IDP教育集团的西蒙·艾米特（Simon Emmett）表示，中国学生对在亚洲留学的兴趣越来越浓。亚洲国家被认为在防疫上的表现更好。

In Australia there have been big falls in the number of Chinese students taking non-degree courses such as English-language lessons, says Peter Hurley of Victoria University’s Mitchell Institute, a think-tank in Melbourne. Students often use these courses as preparation for study at Australian universities. This may suggest that Chinese enrolment at universities in Australia will keep on falling, at least for a while, even after the country reopens.
在澳大利亚，参加英语语言课程等非学位课程的中国学生数量大幅减少，位于墨尔本的智库维多利亚大学米切尔研究所（Mitchell Institute）的彼得·赫尔利（Peter Hurley）表示。学生通常利用这些课程来为进入澳大利亚的大学做准备。这可能意味着即使澳大利亚重新开放边境，至少在一段时间内，当地大学的中国学生人数仍将继续降低。

In China there is another indication of unsettled demand. A large share of the Chinese who leave the country to study commit to doing so at the end of their compulsory education, when they are about 15. At that stage they opt out of preparation for China’s university-entrance exam and instead join senior high schools that offer curriculums focused on study abroad. Francis Miller, a college counsellor at one such school in the city of Xi’an, says the number of 15-year-olds entering its international programme fell sharply in 2020, before recovering somewhat this year. He thinks other, similar schools are having a harder time recruiting students. Xiaofeng Wan, who manages international admissions at Amherst College in America, notes that last year more Chinese children than usual elected to sit the entrance exam for senior secondary schools. Pupils aiming to study abroad sometimes skip this.
在中国，还能看到另一个需求不稳的迹象。中国留学生大多在他们15岁左右完成义务教育时就开始为出国做准备。在这个阶段，他们放弃备战中国的高考，而是进入提供海外留学准备课程的高中。西安一所此类学校的辅导员弗朗西斯·米勒（Francis Miller）表示，参加该校国际课程的15岁学生人数在2020年大幅下降，今年有所回升。他认为其他类似的学校目前招生也更难了。美国阿默斯特学院（Amherst College）负责国际招生的万晓峰指出，去年有比以往更多的中国孩子选择了参加中考。打算出国留学的学生有时会跳过这个升读普通高中的关口。

There are other, long-term, challenges. The number of Chinese of university age is no longer growing. Amid economic headwinds, fewer families will have the resources to splash out on foreign tuition. Meanwhile, China’s own universities are improving. About 47m people are enrolled in tertiary education there, up from around 6m in 1998. Before the pandemic an expert at the British Council, a state-funded cultural organisation, estimated that the number of Chinese seeking a foreign degree could start falling in 2023.
还有其他比较长期的挑战。中国的大学学龄人口已经不再增长。在经济逆风期，有财力负担高额海外学费的家庭数量也会减少。与此同时，中国本土的大学也在进步。中国国内大约有4700万在读大学生，而在1998年时只有约600万人。疫情爆发之前，英国政府资助的文化组织英国文化交易协会（British Council）的专家估计，攻读海外学位的中国学生数量可能从2023年开始下降。

China does not appear keen to deter study abroad. During the pandemic Chinese officials have supported foreign universities’ efforts to help Chinese students continue their studies online, says Brett Berquist of the University of Auckland. The Chinese government has stopped issuing passports to most people, but has given them to those planning to study abroad.
中国似乎并没有要积极阻碍出国留学。奥克兰大学的布雷特·贝奎斯特（Brett Berquist）说，疫情期间外国大学尽力安排中国学生在线上继续学习，中国官员对此也提供了协助。中国政府已经停止向大多数人发放护照，但那些计划出国留学的人还是可以拿到护照。

Officials still want clever young Chinese to get the best training in science, medicine and engineering, wherever in the world it can be found. After all, about 80% of such students return to China after graduating. For many of them, China’s allure ultimately trumps the West’s.
官员们仍然希望聪明的中国年轻人接受最好的科学、医学和工程培训，无论这培训发生在世界何处。毕竟，这些留学生有大约80%都会在毕业后回到中国。对他们中的许多人来说，中国的吸引力最终还是胜过西方。