On June 10th, a group of 14 people from the Confucius Institute of Northern Ireland at Ulster University (CINIUU), led by Ms.Tracey,a program officer of the International Department of the Institute,came to our university to carry out a learning exchange activities.PresidentLeiRujin,President’s Office,the International Exchange Department, and other department heads attended the welcome reception.The heads of functional departments such as the President’s Office,Publicity Department,Student Affairs Department, and College of Foreign Studies,as well as the person in charge of the teaching unit,also participated in the relevant work of this event.

At the welcome ceremony, President Lei Rujin extended a warm welcome to the delegation,introduced the basic situation of Hubei Normal University and reviewed the years of cooperation between our university and Ulster University.He stated that our school has jointly established a Confucius Institute,eight Confucius Classrooms and one Martial Arts Center in Northern Ireland and with the strong support of the Chinese and British governments,these institutions are running well with remarkable achievements and promising prospects.Our university will select 20 international Chinese teachers and 16 volunteer teachers to teach Chinese at the Confucius Institute this year.The president stressed that this group is the first batch of delegations to visit our university after the epidemic,looking forward to more delegations from Ulster University will come to our university for exchange and hope to further strengthen mutual visits and exchanges between our two universities, so as to lay a solid foundation for comprehensive cooperation.

Ms. Tracey Johnston expressed sincere gratitude for the welcome reception on behalf of the visiting delegation. She said that this China trip brought them a lot of opportunities to learn about the rich Chinese culture and understand the Chinese colorful society. The students of this delegation have all completed the language test of the HSK1, and two of them (Liam Bailey and Kiall Carmichael, the student representatives) had met the Chinese ambassador before leaving Northern Ireland. Liam and Kiall said that they love Chinese culture very much and are full of expectations for the coming courses, such as Mandarin, Paper Cutting, Martial Arts and Calligraphy offered by Hubei Normal University. They believe that Confucius Institutes are very helpful for them to learn Chinese language and culture, which help them understand China in a better way.

The School of Foreign Languages held an interactive activity to welcome the teachers and students of the visiting delegation from Ulster University at 3 0’clock p.m. During the activity, students from both Ulster University and Hubei Normal University communicated with each other. They shared ideas and talents about language learning, culture, art, and so on. And they sang and danced together in a joyful atmosphere, further deepening the friendship between the two sides. This week, the members of the visiting delegation will have some courses including Chinese Traditional Culture, Comprehensive Chinese, Chinese Martial Arts, Chinese Fine Arts and so on provided by our school. Then they will visit some places of interest in Hubei and participate in the Chinese proficiency test-HSK.

This arrival of the delegation from Ulster University will effectively promote the in-depth development of cooperation between our two universities.