But today’s Chinese students on America’s campuses are quite different.  As the title suggests, “China’s Nouveau Riche Have Landed on American Campuses.”   Chinese students today have money to burn. Drive fancy cars, go to exclusive nightclubs, and generally find ways to enjoy their lives on American campuses. Many are also serious students. But their reasons for coming to United States and their goals after they finish their education are much different than they were in the 1990s and prior.
I was happy to be quoted in this story.   It’s part of a series on Chinese students in America, and I recommend the entire series.
 Great College Advice

 
 

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TRANSCRIPT:

So I’m on the campus of California Institute of Technology. Otherwise known as Caltech, here in Pasadena, California. And I’m outside Fleming House, which is one of the nine houses in which undergraduate students live. These are like Hogwarts; you’ve got Slytherin and Gryffindor and Hufflepuff kinds of houses where the undergraduate students live.

Small Acceptance Number

I want to point out, behind me there’s a group of Chinese children who are touring Caltech. And we also ran into another group of students from China, from Chengdu, who are touring Caltech. The interesting thing about Caltech admissions for international students is that the statistics are really pretty mind-boggling in terms of the difficulty of getting into this school. There are only about 230, 240 undergraduates accepted to this school every year. So the undergraduate population is slightly less than 1,000 students. 1,000 students! 6% of them are from overseas, are not American citizens.

Hard for International Students

Now, one of the statistics that’s interesting is 6% of students are born somewhere besides the United States. But that means 94% of the students who go here are American citizens. So we saw these groups of Chinese students and children who are ambitious. And probably maybe excellent in sciences. And really want to come to Caltech, and have paid a lot of money to come visit Caltech. But only 15 students out of the entire world will be accepted to Caltech next year. So it’s interesting to me that people will make this enormous investment to travel all the way to the United States to come visit this particular institution. When their chances of admission are miniscule.

Of course there are some people, always, every year, 15 or so, that are admitted from all over the planet And so we always want to hold out hope that we are the one. But it really is interesting to me, the daunting numbers in admissions are. It’s just overwhelmingly competitive for an international student. However, this is one of the most prestigious and most active research institutes in the United States.

A ton of sciences happening here. The federal government has invested billions of dollars into this school in terms of the scientific research that goes on here. I think I read 23 Nobel laureates are now at Caltech. It’s obviously an incredible scientific institute. However, it’s super difficult to get into.
 
Mark Montgomery
Expert Educational Consultant

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I’m here right now on the campus of the University of Delaware.  It’s in the far north of the state of Delaware, not too far from Philadelphia but also close to Baltimore.  This is a wonderful public university, sort of a hidden gem, really, partly because Delaware is a small state.
I think about this school a lot when I talk to my Chinese students because it’s a large public university.  There’s a lot going on.  The DuPont building is right across the way, so, Chemistry is kind of big, certainly a comprehensive university.
The other thing that I like about it, it’s not so large.  It’s also close to several different urban areas, but not right in them, so, you can feel a part in sort of the Ivory Tower, if you will, but certainly can get into some of the major metropolitan areas in the United States by train.
It’s just not as well known as the Universities of Virginia, Michigan, North Carolina, Berkley, UCLA, the usual suspects when it comes to public universities in the United States.  So, if you’re looking for a comprehensive university that’s not overwhelmingly large but has a solid undergraduate education program, this is definitely worth a look.  It’s gorgeous.
Again, I’m here on a nice spring day around the time of finals, but there are students out on the lawn and the downtown area, the little main street with all the funky cafes, lots of people and a lot of people are studying too.  I see people going to the library behind me, so, a lot of people are heading that direction. A very nice university and I’m really glad I had a chance to visit myself.

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Several factors lie behind the shifting attitudes: China’s increased exposure to the West; concerns about how children will manage in a creative, knowledge-based economy; and studies indicating increasing mental health problems among children.

More than 30 million people younger than 18, or about 1 in 10, are suffering from depression and behavioral problems, according to the China Population Communication Center. Anxiety disorders among college students increased 8 percent between 1992 and 2005, and depression rose by 7 percent, Zhang Hanxiang, chairman of the center, said at a nationwide youth mental health meeting in December. Drug-taking, violence, Internet addiction and suicide are all on the rise.

Eighty-four percent of high school students reported feeling depressed and under stress. Nearly 50 percent of elementary school students said they felt anger and shame after being criticized by parents or teachers, the study found.

Compounding this, over one in three children are an only child, raising expectations sharply in a country where parents regard children as a key source of old-age security. In a survey at an elementary school in the city of Xian, conducted by Xian Evening News, 85 percent of 300 students said academic pressure was excessive. Still, 87 percent said they were happier at school than at home, where they said they felt lonely, unable to communicate with parents who cared about their studies but not their feelings or physical welfare.

I am finding that ambitious Chinese families who have the money are taking their kids out of Chinese schools and putting them in international schools or specialized programs that will prepare them for overseas study.  Many of my Chinese clients come from these schools.  Some of them have “Chinese mothers” of the type exemplified by Amy Chua.  Others have mothers who are Chinese who resemble American soccer moms.  Either way, these families are learning that doing things in the Chinese way is not always the best method of getting their kids into top American universities.
The admissions rules are different in the United States.  While it is true that the valedictorian may have some statistical advantage over the kids who is number 5 in his class, it is also true that plenty of kids who do not have impeccable grades and test scores are admitted to Ivy League and other top universities.  Within the American admissions system, there are many ways for a student to stand out besides having the best grades in the class.
The Chinese educational system, however, is a strict meritocracy that dates back to the imperial examinations system:  no matter who you are or where you live, if you pass the exam with a high enough score, you will earn entrance to the top university in the country.  Everything depends on that examination.
Cut and dried.  Clear.
One of my perennial duties as a counselor to Chinese families is to explain that preparing for American university entrance in the Chinese way is not going to work.  If you want to play the American admissions game, you have to play by American rules. So extracurricular activities become important to Chinese Tiger Mothers.  Community service is becoming more common as top-flight Chinese students seek ways to pad their resumes and demonstrate that they are more than a test score.  Bright and shiny educational centers are popping up all over China with the aim of grooming the academically robotic Chinese student to become a warm and fuzzy and chipper and perky American college applicant.
In other words, as Amy Chua argues that America needs more Chinese mothers, Chinese mothers in China are trying to adopt more American attitudes about education.  As the New York Times article points out, these moves away from the “Tiger Mother” model are slow:  it’s hard to break centuries of cultural habit.  But as anyone who has studied the Chinese economic miracle of the past 30 years knows, the Chinese are masters at adopting and adapting the knowledge and habits of others in order to achieve longer term goals.
So what is the trend?  Certainly, American colleges and universities (as well as boarding schools) can expect more and more applicants from China:  the pace of growth is truly staggering. More important, however, admissions offices everywhere can expect more and more applicants from kids who have grown up in some sort of a hybrid environment:  taking a more Western-style curriculum participating in more American-style extracurricular activities, and thus becoming more attractive applicants for American top colleges.
In fact, because so many Chinese students are frankly better prepared, academically speaking, than their American counterparts, and because so many Chinese families are able and willing to pay full price for an American education, some admissions offices may find it difficult to control the numbers of Chinese students they admit.  At the University of Colorado, for example, Chinese students make up well over half of all foreign students on the Boulder campus.  The university has decided to double its number of international students in the next few years:  with the flood of Chinese applicants, this goal will not be difficult to achieve.  However, international educators on campus worry that they may have to limit Chinese enrollments in order to encourage enrollments from Latin America, Europe, Africa and other parts of Asia.
As a student of Chinese culture and as a consultant to both American and Chinese families, I enjoy watching this sort of cultural rapprochement as more American parents pressure their kids to take every AP course available, and as  more Chinese parents encourage their kids to play and explore their extracurricular talents.
Mark Montgomery
Educational Consultant

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The book, written in Chinese, aims to educate Chinese families about schools beyond the Ivy League and the large public universities that tend to be the only ones most Chinese families will consider.

Inside HigherEd offers an interview with the three young authors.  I’m going to have to buy the book!

Mark Montgomery
Educational Consultant in China

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I asked him if he would share a bit of his educational history on camera, and he agreed.  Here’s a brief clip of our conversation.

Mark Montgomery
Independent College Consultant

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