A learning group of nine students headed by Resident Fellow Ms. Sisi SUN from CKLC and six students headed by Prof. Chen Yun, Prof. Gu Xin and Mr. Li Kang from Zhide College of Fudan University participated in an eight-day Shanghai-Anji Innovation and Entrepreneurship Summer Program from July 8 to 15, 2018. This program is centered on residential service, urban entrepreneurship and ecology-friendly development.
The program started with a three-day visit in Shanghai, where our students went to visit the Nandong Sub-District Office, Nandong Elderly Care Home and Nandong Guizhou Residential Community. Upon the visits, our students had in-depth discussions about residential care improvement with local officials and residents. Teachers and students also visited the Shanghai Urban Planning Exhibition Hall, Shanghai First Department Store and Huangpu Branch of Bank of China, during which they learned more about Shanghai, a metropolitan of 200 million people, as well as its commerce, tourism, cutting-edge science and technology. The visits in Shanghai expose our students to the rapid changes sweeping across China and help nurture in them the sense of leadership for future changes.
The three-day visit in Shanghai was followed by a five-day field study in Anji, where students for the first time in their lifetime saw the tea plantation and the sea of bamboo. They got a unique learning opportunity to communicate with the tea planter and the manager of the bamboo cellulose fiber factory. Our students were deeply moved on hearing how they overcame the difficulties and met with the challenges when they started-up their business. Later the students also visited Anji Eco-Museum, Long Wang Shan Tea Corporation Limited, Yong Yu Bamboo LLC, Former Residence of Wu Changshuo, and Zhiqing Courtyard. From all these visits, they got to know how much Anji people endeavored for the sustainable development and for a new, green community.
The Macao students and Fudan students come from different cultural backgrounds, and therefore have different senses of history, cultural traditions and values. When they join this hands-on field-study program, there were surely various questions, enthusiastic discussions and even debates. At the end of the program, students presented, shared and exchanged what they have learnt these days. They said that this program helped them break their cultural stereotype to better understand different communities with different cultural backgrounds. At the same time the program helped to foster and enhance their skills to listen, observe, analyze, understand and to integrate. This summer program definitely opens a new chapter of collaboration for both students and colleges!