Brussels, 04/06/2008 (Agence Europe) - The European commissioner for multilingualism, Leonard Orban, and the Chinese deputy minister for education, Zhang Xinsheng, officially launched the EU-China language exchange programme, "EU Window", on Monday 2 June. This will be a four-year project (2009-2013), presented at the 10th EU-China Summit (November 2007) and sponsored by the Chinese government. It will allow 200 European teachers of Chinese in schools and 400 head teachers from the member states to improve their skills in Chinese and their familiarity with Chinese culture. The first phase of the EU Window programme will last two years and consist of two activities: summer school courses for 50 teachers of Chinese from the member states of the European Union and a 10-day study visit for 100 head teachers and administrators in the teaching sector of the member states of the EU.
In the first phase of the EU-China a linguistic bursaries programme (which was carried out in 2007), which was aimed at children, around 100 European students were granted bursaries to visit China in order to learn the language. As part of a structural dialogue between the EU and China on the subject of education and culture, an initial technical meeting was held in Brussels on 31 January 2008 between representatives of the Commission and of the Chinese Ministry of Education. The two sides agreed on the three main priority themes (language teaching, joint doctorates and education via sport) which will be used as a basis for cooperation activities over the next two years. The first of these activities will consist of a conference on languages to be held in Beijing in March 2009, to coincide with Commissioner Orban's visit to China. This country is one of the best-represented countries in Erasmus Mundus (a mobility programme in the field of education). No fewer than 450 Chinese students (out of a total of around 4000) benefited from bursaries allowing them to study in Europe, and 20 Chinese universities are involved in partnerships with Erasmus Mundus consortiums. (I.L.)