Chinese Guest Teacher Program

Click here to view the Mandarin Chinese brochure

GCS is welcoming new Mandarin Chinese teachers to classrooms across the district as students prepare to take advantage of the international Chinese Guest Teacher Program, which seeks to immerse U.S. students in Chinese language and culture.

Wu Cai Xia is teaching at Northwest High, Xu Guili at High Point Central High and Xia Ou Yang has joined the Ferndale Middle team. There are also two Mandarin Chinese teachers at Northwood Elementary and one at Page High.

Co-sponsored by the College Board and Hanban (China’s Office of Chinese Language Council International), the program began in 2006 with the first group arriving in January 2007. This latest group of 64 is the second one to arrive and more than doubles the number of participating teachers. They have been dispersed among districts in 23 states, teaching high school, middle school and elementary school.

The guest teachers work at host schools for two years, and then renew for an additional year if both the school and teacher are satisfied. Hanban provides the teachers with monthly stipends and international transportation, while host schools and districts provide housing, local transportation and administrative fees. All three teachers in GCS are living with host families.

The national language of the more than 1.3 billion inhabitants of China and millions more ethnic Chinese around the globe, Chinese is the most widely spoken first language in the world. Though more than 200 million Chinese schoolchildren are studying English—often begun as early as the second grade—experts estimate that no more than 50,000 U.S. students are studying Chinese.

Northwest Guilford High is also participating in the Chinese Guest Teacher Program; however, the teacher has not yet arrived to the school.