Return to China, DECISIONS?!

[ZakClements]

Hey guys, i've been registered a while but only recently started visiting quite often. I made this post because I would like some advice on what you guys think would be the best option moving forward with regards to my current situation.

 

Let me explain my current situation. I'm a 21 year old, final year student at Nottingham Trent University, United Kingdom. My major is Chinese (Mandarin) & Global studies and I spent my third year abroad with the Confucius Institute Scholarship at Beijing Language and Culture University. My YA was by far the best year of my life and all I want now is for this final year of studying to be over and return to China. 

 

Now it's what i'm going to do after my BA that has put me in a pickle. I have three options which I believe are available to me:

 

No.1 - Apply for the CSC scholarship to study in China, my choice of MA will be International Trade/ Economics/ Distribution. My three choices of city are (In order of preference) Guangzhou, Shanghai, Nanchang. Guangzhou because I have many friends there, it is not far from Hong Kong (Where I have quite a lot of family), a coastal city, warm winters and what I believe to be a beautiful city. I've looked at the Guangdong University of Foreign Studies. Shanghai because i've never been. I have experienced Beijing, I want to try another big city, something fresh. In Shanghai the University of International Studies has caught my attention. Finally, Nanchang. This is the easiest option to me because of a friend I have in my hometown who is helping me speak with admissions. Their requirements are 2 letters of recommendation and BA certificate and level 4 HSK. But my friend has told me a lot of bad things about this city, so he's putting me off. What is putting me off the most about an MA in China is that I don't believe HSK 5 to be no way near enough to study an MA with Chinese students! - what do you guys think? I've been looking around at the process of applying for the CSC and it is putting me off. HSK 5 is the exam i'll be taking next March, but I think it's not too difficult with the 3 and a bit years of studying Chinese that I have had - but this means I won't have the certificate until April. I don't graduate until May and don't get my BA certificate until July. The references i'm in the process of getting but i'm worried that I won't have the required material to apply for this time round. 

 

 

No. 2 - I've been working on a TEFL qualification and following this I believe it will be fairly simple to gain employment as a teacher somewhere in China. This would help me get back to China (On the infamous Business Visa) earn a fairly decent wage and just get by. I taught a little during my time in Beijing and thought it was great fun. I believe I could do it for one or two years, improve my Chinese, make some networks and save a little money. Following this then maybe apply for an MA somewhere in China - i'd have the money saved from teaching so I could support myself a little better alongside the CSC.

 

No. 3 - I apply for a scholarship to further my Chinese level - then apply for an MA. I had a friend who did this at BLCU, he arrived with no prior knowledge of Chinese, studied like mad, received a scholarship from Tsinghua to study some sort of engineering and is now killing it over there!

 

Sorry about the long post guys, 

 

cheers for reading  

[Frederik451]

i'll be reading along on this one. i too am quite interested in finding out if hsk 5 is enough. i've heard that the requirements is different from university to university, but that those who gets accepted on a university only with hsk 5 are struggling quite a lot. personally my goal is to take level 6 before my bachelor is done here in denmark, as i just don't believe that hsk 5 is even near enough to do a master with chinese people in china.

[gato]

Regardless of what HSK level, if you cannot easily read a Chinese newspaper (let alone a textbook), it would be difficult to study at a BA or MA level in Chinese. It'll be a much better experience if you can improve your Chinese to such a minimal literacy level before you start such a course.

[ChTTay]

No.1

I agree with what others have said. HSK 5 may be the requirement on paper to get into a Chinese language course but, in reality, your Chinese will need to be much better. Even if you passed HSK 6, I still think doing a degree would mean having to learn a huge amount of Chinese and, at the same time, learn the topic you are studying.

Equally, you need to find out what value, if any, a masters in China would hold with UK employers. Assuming one day you would work in the UK.

 

No.2

If you are fresh out of University, this might be a good experience. Rather than continue to study at a University for an additional 1 or 2 years. You could look at this as a chance to 'get out there' a bit while it would still help your goal of improving your Chinese. You can easily work and study on the side with a 1 on 1 tutor or classes. It would also enable you to try live in one of the places you mentioned, then you could move to the other for University.

By business visa, you mean the Z work visa right?

 

Anyway,

I'd say pursue number 2 or 3 first, then try and do 1.

 

Keep us posted

[langxia]

I would also go with number 2 or number 3.

I was studying my Subject with only an Hsk 4, but after I took the test I still was taking one semester of language courses in China. The advantage I had was that most of the stuff that was thought in Class was about subjects I was familiar with already. So even if I didn't understand the Chinese I was still able to follow because I knew the subject. Also I had the advantage that a lot of subjects we studied was written by French/German/English Authors where I then proceeded to get the E-book in the original language. Of course in class we had to talk about it in Chinese, but I could manage that with a little simpler vocabulary than the written one.

One of the problems was when there was a teacher with an accent I wasn't used to. We had one guest professor from Taiwan where I had a very hard time following and he used to ask me stuff sometimes how the situation was in Europe on that particular matter, but also other professors I couldn't understand what they were talking about at all cause of their accent.

What you could do is to decide on one university and then go to that university for language courses for a semester, during this semester you could ask if it was possible to visit some classes of the major you want to study, you can tell them it is to see if your language level is high enough to understand everything. This way at the end of your semester you can see if you will be able to follow the classes the next semester, if you think it is still too hard then just take another language semester. the other advantage of this would be that you are already familiar with the university and it's surroundings and when you take up your major you can fully focus on it and not still need to get to know everything around.

[Lu]

I agree that option 1 is probably a bit optimistic.

Option 2: if you have good self discipline and/or can find a good tutor; if you want to work and not just study; if you're sure that you can fit in enough studying next to the teaching to really improve your Chinese.

Option 3: if you prefer studying some more before starting working; if you want to focus on learning Chinese full-time and not also teach.

My preference would be option 3, but you're not me, so just see which would be a better fit for you.

[ZakClements]

I had a few friends who were at the opposite university of BLCU, Dizhi Daxue or something like that. One particular friend had a pretty decent standard of Chinese, he said that he didn't really cope with the class (He was studying something like Petroleum Engineering!) but managed to get by by using the chosen course texts books in English. Unlike Langxia though, i'll be studying a subject which i've had very little experience with so I won't know what sort of information i'll be expected to know. 

 

The biggest obstacle for me will be funds, this is why option 2 seems like the best option. I'll be able to teach, integrate myself within some chinese groups and gradually improve my Chinese AND save some money for future studies. With regards to my chinese studies in Beijing, my level improved but not as much as when I had some relationships with Chinese girls. They weren't interested in the english language and couldn't speak it, this is was the best thing for my Chinese. Listening and speaking improved massively! - though reading and writing took a bit of a hit - also, about CSC, how would one go about obtaining an acceptance letter from a University? I've seen a few agency websites online, but all seems a bit shady. 

 

In terms of option 3, I've seen some topics on this forum about people going over on a scholarship to do language study and then during language study, apply for a scholarship for further study (in my case MA) is this easy to come by? - will they see that i've already spent a year at BLCU with language study and this will affect my chances of getting a scholarship the second time negatively?

 

I still think it's crazy that Nanchang Uni's HSK requirements is only level 4! 

[Angelina]

 

 

will they see that i've already spent a year at BLCU with language study and this will affect my chances of getting a scholarship the second time negatively

 

No. I did option 1, both times fully funded. 

 

 

My advice: 

1. What would you be planning to do if you had never been to China? Grad school, work? What field? Forget about China and all its allure and think about your life.

2. Then try to see if it is realistic to make that happen in China. Language proficiency included in the reality check. The new HSK is easy by the way. 

[ZakClements]

My major is Chinese and global studies, which is a social science. I haven't really got a specialisation, which is why I want to progress onto an MA. I think going over to teach to save some money to help fund a masters seems to be the most desireable option at the moment.

[Angelina]

I am doing an MA because I am really interested in this research area. You need to be sure what you want, pressure is high. 

Maybe it is better for you to be teaching English for a year, since you like living in China and you can work on your Chinese. Plus earn some money. 

Be careful with your visa.