CRI听力:Vice Premier announces scholarships for American students

China and the United States have held the first round of a bilateral social and people-to-people dialogue in Washington DC.

As one of the many outcomes of the dialogue, China announced ten thousand scholarships over the next four years to help more American students study in China.

Chinese vice premier Liu Yandong made the announcement during an event at George Washington University.

"To further accelerate the exchanges between the youth from the two countries, China will launch a program to award excellent US students. In the next four years, China will provide ten thousand scholarships to American students to study in China for a short term."

Mycal Ford, the student Ambassador for the noNPRofit US-China Strong Foundation, was very excited and said he would love to apply for that scholarship.

The young African American man was the first college student in his family. He revealed that it was kind of a remote dream that one day he would be able to speak a foreign language and visit a foreign country as far away as China. But the dream became possible when he was awarded a scholarship to study in China a few years ago.

"When I had the opportunity to go to China, I immediately seized on it. Because someone comes from a low-income-family and the first person in my family to go to colleague, graduate from high school, I thought this would be a phenomenal chance."

He was fascinated by the rich culture and history of China. And with the help of two more scholarships, he was able to go back to China for further studies and became a role model for many American students today. He is very grateful to the support he received that had helped broaden his horizon.

World renowned pianist Lang Lang also hailed the idea of encouraging American students to visit China during summer or winter breaks.

"There is something that I found out that as a Chinese, we actually know America more than the younger generation American know China."

Chinese young people have a stronger interest in learning about the United States. Currently there are over 300,000 Chinese students studying in the U.S. Every one-in-three international students in the U.S. is Chinese. There is a strong need to make up for the deficit.

Roberto Belloso, a graduate student at George Washington University, encouraged his American peers to take the opportunity. He had previously worked at a hedge fund in Shanghai and found that the so-called cultural shock may not be as strong as we had thought.

"When I was going to China, especially at the Hedge Fund, I was scared out of hell like a very big cultural shock, especially at the office. But my experience was that we're much more similar than we actually think we're, than we think we're different, especially on a human level."

Both young people and state leaders at the dialogue say the future of China-U.S. relations lies in the youth. Vice Premier Liu Yandong encouraged the young generation to carry the baton and consolidate the foundation of China-U.S. relations for the next 50 years.