Interactive Chat with Sarah Carr
Jan. 31, 2007 -- Sarah Carr spent five weeks reporting in China through a fellowship with the International Reporting Project at the Johns Hopkins University. Join her for a chat about schools and life in China.
Q: Greg H. of Stallis - You sound very adventurous, and as someone who's always loved to travel to strange countries I was curious if you were able to learn to speak Chinese while you over there? Also, as a man with proud Irish roots, do you hear of a program of teaching Irish to folks in China? I'd love to spread the culture. Thanks.
A: Sarah Carr - Hi Greg and everyone else. I studied Mandarin for a couple of months before I left. And my pronunciation definitely improved quite a bit while I was there. But Mandarin is a really difficult language to learn, and I can still only say a handful of phrases. I'm keeping up with the Chinese classes, though. To answer your second question. If you email me at [email protected] I can send you the contact information for someone you can ask about efforts to teach Irish in China. There's definitely a huge demand for native English speakers to teach in China's schools, as just about all the schools there have English departments.
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Q: Jaime of MKE - What's a typical school day like for a Chinese elementary student?
A: Sarah Carr - I spent more time visiting classes at the middle and high school level. But I can say that the school days there were generally much longer and more structured. At many public schools, even the elementary students would live at the school, and start classes fairly early in the morning. Even in the younger grades, students might have 40 or 50 peers in their classes, and spend the bulk of their time between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. sitting in a desk at a classroom. Nearly all of the students took an hour or two around lunchtime for a nap. Many parents complained to me that they had to over-book their children's time from a very young age to prepare them for the competitive school environment of the older grades. I interviewed one Shanghai mother who sent her five year old to an intensely academic program from Mon.-Fri. and to another school on Sat. and Sun. to make sure he would be prepared for first grade.
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Q: Tom of Milwaukee - Do children in China receive any language education? What about technical schools - are there special schools such as we have here.
A: Sarah Carr - Hi. They receive much more language education than we do here. Nearly every school I visited started teaching students English in the elementary grades, and many students also studied a third language. They focus much more heavily on grammar and vocabulary when teaching English, so a high-school student might have perfect grammar but not be able to actually communicate in English. But overall, they have made teaching students English a major priority of their schools. As to your second question, the Chinese government and entrepreneurs are trying to expand the number of technical or pre-professional schools. There's a glut of university graduates in China right now, and there's a lot of interest in diversifying the types of training and schooling the students are receiving beyond the standard university track.
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Q: Ralph of Milwaukee - It sounds like you were in a lot of places in China that didn't see a lot of Western visitors. Did you feel conspicuous at all? Did you run into many Americans or Europeans in these areas?
A: Sarah Carr - Hi. Most of the coastal cities I visited (Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Ningbo) were pretty used to visitors. But when I went to the Henan Province to visit one student's home village, I entered a region less accustomed to Western visitors. I definitely felt conspicuous there. When we passed one man reading a magazine who didn't look up, my translator, Liu Liu, observed that the magazine must have been very engrossing since he was the first person who hadn't stared at me. I was treated amazingly graciously, though, and ended up feeling a bit spoiled. In the hotel we stayed in while in Henan, they put little luxuries in my room--a comforter and bath towels--that no one else seemed to get. I never felt unsafe by being so conspicuous. If anything, it made me feel more safe.
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Q: Susan of Shepherdstown, WV - Did you ever have the feeling that you were being watched, checked up on?
A: Sarah Carr - No, not really. I know they've monitored many journalists quite closely, and I was there on a journalist's visa. But my topic wasn't considered particularly controversial. I deviated from my itinerary quite a bit, and visited several schools that were illegal and unrecognized by the government. But I was never told that I couldn't go somewhere or talk to someone. And I never felt like anyone was following me or listening in on my phone conversations.
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Q: JJ of Bay - Sarah, what habit or custom from China would you most like to see take root in the U.S.?
A: Sarah Carr - That's a good question. I'll tell you a couple. I enjoyed the more communal and leisurely approach to eating. Groups or families would sit around a table with a lazy susan filled with different dishes, and then share them all. In America, I sometimes feel like we eat like pigs at a trough, just shoving food down and then moving on to something else. I was also impressed by how much care families gave to the elderly. Extended families were more likely to live together, and children considered it an obligation to care for their parents as they aged.
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Q: Mary of Milwaukee - Given the limited weight allowed in luggage, did you pack enough or too much? What are your suggestions for clothing? And, what kind of souvenirs did you bring home, or mail?
A: Sarah Carr - I brought along a small backpack, a small suitcase, and a bag for my laptop computer. I wish I'd packed less. It quickly became a pain to lug everything all over China, and limited the number of gifts I could bring back for people. I bought some scrolls and some sets of chopsticks, but little else.
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Q: Anna of Denver - formerly of Milwaukee - Great stories Sarah. It's amazing how hospitable people are all over the world. When spending time with your Chinese hosts...did you ever hear about their thoughts on their government or political views? It probably wouldn't be the most polite thing to bring up in conversation...but did you get a sense they felt they were also representing a country whose government is often criticized...and maybe that made them want to show you, an American, that they were kind, hospitable people?
A: Sarah Carr - Hi Anna. Yes, people often made political comments without my even asking. And I felt like some people went out of their way to say they disagreed with some policies of their government--like one scholar who told me he wished the government would be much more open in talking about the tragedies of the Cultural Revolution. I think it's a natural impulse of people in every country to want to be seen as individuals and not be identified solely by the policies of their government. That said, I did see more nationalistic pride in China than in America. They were incredibly excited about the Beijing Olympics of 2008. And two couples told me they were waiting to have babies until 2008, so their children would be born in The Year of the Olympics.
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Q: Claire of Milwaukee - What is the feeling in China about Americans adopting so many of their country's little girls? Are they resentful or grateful?
A: Sarah Carr - Hi. I didn't talk with many people about American adoptions while I was there. I was curious about the recent tightening up of adoption procedures--making it impossible to adopt from China unless you are married, healthy, rich and young. And I wondered if part of that might have been motivated by a sense of national pride. They don't want to feel like just any American can adopt their children.
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Q: Tom of Milwaukee - In your story on Sunday, you described some exotic, if slightly less than appetizing food dishes. Did you have a chance to sample anything equally exotic, but tastier?
A: Sarah Carr - I really loved the food in China. The seafood was amazingly fresh, and nearly all of the food was less processed. Some of my favorite things: lychee in good sauces; steamed buns filled with vegetables or pork; fresh shrimp; bowls of rice noodles with a fried egg on top.
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Q: Jim H. of Brookfield - Sarah, couple of questions at one time. How much emphasis do the Chinese put on education, and up to what level (equal to our high school, college, etc.), and does it vary from urban to rural areas. Finally, is there anything you saw that U.S. school districts could learn from or incorporate? Thanx.
A: Sarah Carr - Hi. The Chinese families put a great deal of emphasis on education, and will go to great lengths to support their children in school. There's a very rigid exam system in China, and your score on the exam basically dictates whether you can go to a good high school or college. So there's a lot of pressure on the students to do well on those exams. There were huge gaps between the quality of education in the urban and rural areas. The public city schools I saw had first-rate teachers and facilities, while the rural ones had dirt floors and seemed like they belonged in an era gone by.
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Q: Elliott of Massachusetts - At what time in your journey through China were you most scared?
A: Sarah Carr - Hi Dad. I wasn't really scared much at all. If I had to pick a place, I'd say Shenzhen. It's a southern boomtown with a lot of crime and prostitution. A couple of people tried to pick my pocket there. I remember one man who thrust a Buddha figurine at me and then demanded a fee for "making money by spreading peace." When he saw I wouldn't pay, the peacemonger snatched it back. All in all, I was more scared about doing a good job reporting than anything else, though.
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Q: John Harrington of Bettendorf, Iowa - Hi Sarah. Congrats on your trip and a great article. How would you compare Chinese students versus American students? Janette and I have a South Korean Foreign Exchange student living with us this year and his education system is very different than ours.
A: Sarah Carr - Hi! In general, I felt like the Chinese students were more accustomed to working hard than the American students. But their education system is built around lectures and preparing for an exam. Many people told me that Chinese students who come to the United States have a hard time adapting to the more open-ended system here, and that being asked to write an analytical essay or structure their own time can be a challenge. Often times, it took awhile before I could get students in Chinese classrooms to feel comfortable asking me questions about myself. They were more used to be talked at, not asking questions.
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Q: Tom of Nashville - Did you have any special immunizations before travel to China?
A: Sarah Carr - I'm trying to remember. I think I had the measles, mumps and rubella shot, and the Hepatitis vaccinations. I also took malaria pills while I was there. That's all I can remember.
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Q: Sara of Bay View - Hi Sarah How much political education does it seem that children receive in schools in China? What about history of their country - and others?
A: Sarah Carr - There were political undertones to a lot of the teaching. One interesting shift I'd observed...there's a lot less emphasis on teaching about the history of Communism and Mao Zedong than there was 10 years ago or so. Now, the focus is more on teaching the traditional Chinese values emphasized by philosophers like Confucius. I wrote a story about it for The Christian Science Monitor. Here's the link: www.csmonitor.com/2006/1208/p01s04-woap.html
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Q: Marty of Milwaukee - How lucky you are to have experienced China in this way, and how thoughtfully your experience was shared. THank you. I wondered if you were sick at all while there, "traveler's flu" or anything else? Were you prepared with meds you brought along, or used Chinese herbal remedies?
A: Sarah Carr - I didn't get sick at all, and had more energy there than I usually have here, actually. I attribute it to the food being fresher and less processed. I don't think high-fructose corn syrup helps any of us make it through the day.
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Q: Courtney of Wauwatosa - How much training do teachers receive in China?
A: Sarah Carr - This is a really good question and something I should have done more research on. My sense was that it was fairly comparable to the training American teachers receive. I remember interviewing one teacher in a private school who only had an associate's degree and wasn't eligible for a job at a public school as a result. There's also a new test the government instituted to try to strengthen the pool of rural teachers. Many of the teachers in more remote parts of the country didn't pass the test, and now there's a shortage of qualified teachers in some rural places.
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Q: Leslie of Pewaukee - When I visited China and asked some questions, I felt some of the answers were "safe" and sometimes I was just told they didn't feel comfortable answering the questions. Did you feel that some people were afraid to give you their honest opinions about things in China that were under government control?
A: Sarah Carr - That's a good question. I felt like education was a pretty easy topic to report on in that most people felt comfortable being open and honest about their feelings. One of the other reporters in my group went to China to report on HIV/AIDS policies, and she had a much harder time getting people to talk to her than I did. HIV was a more taboo topic, and people tried to avoid addressing it directly, she said. At times, I definitely felt like people stuck with safer answers, particularly when the conversation shifted toward more sensitive turf. But overall I was somewhat surprised by how open and forthright the people I interviewed were.
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Q: Tom B. of Nashville - Could you talk a little bit more about the food and cost of living in China?
A: Sarah Carr - The cost of living has been going up, most particularly in the cities. I paid anything from $10 for a hotel room to $100, depending on how fancy and urban it was. Food was very affordable when compared with the United States. I rarely paid more than a dollar or two for a meal, if that, and ate like a king. That's all the questions I have time for right now. But thank you all for writing in and reading the story. Sarah
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