Roxboro Middle School establishes Confucius Classroom with May 5 ceremonial signing

The Confucius Institute (CI) at Cleveland State University announces the founding of its first Confucius Classroom at Roxboro Middle School in the Cleveland Heights-University Heights City School District (CH-UH).

At 8:30 a.m. on Monday, May 5, Nylajean McDaniel, CH-UH superintendent, and Haigang Zhou, CI director, will sign the official Confucius Classroom agreement at Roxboro Middle School (2400 Roxboro Road, Cleveland Heights). A Confucius Classroom plaque will also be presented to Roxboro Middle School, host of the classroom.

CSU’s CI and CH-UH schools have enjoyed a partnership for more than four years, and have worked together to build and strengthen the Chinese language and culture education within the CH-UH district. In 2013, CH-UH applied to become a Confucius Classroom.

Becoming a Confucius Classroom allows a school district to apply for grants to fund its Chinese programs, buy textbooks, increase Chinese class offerings and host Chinese cultural programming within its schools. It also allows the district to apply for teachers to teach Chinese classes on a short-term basis.

Confucius Classroom students also receive priority in applying for CI programming, including study abroad, Chinese proficiency testing, scholarships and more.

CSU’s CI was established in August 2008 and is a partnership between CSU, the Office of Chinese Language Council International (the “Hanban”), and Beijing’s Capital University of Economics and Business. The mission of the CSU’s CI is to enhance understanding of Chinese language, culture and business, and to promote Chinese language learning for business and commerce to the local community. CSU’s also serves as a bridge connecting the university and the local business community to Chinese institutions and organizations for academic and business purposes. For more information, visit www.csuohio.edu/confucius.