Chinese students Li ‘Lily’ Kunzhao, Cheng ‘Hope’ Jingyi and Ma ‘Leaf’ Yezi, Li ‘Kevin’ Yichen and Zhou ‘Kevin’ Chuhan have spent the past several weeks in South Georgia, attending Valwood.

Valwood School has hosted several international guests for the past several weeks.

Li “Kevin” Yichen, Zhou “Kevin” Chuhan, Cheng “Hope” Jingyi, Li “Lily” Kunzhao and Ma “Leaf” Yezi — the students have all chosen American names to use while they visit — are all sophomores in high school from Beijing, China. For the past five weeks, they have been attending Valwood School as a part of an exchange program through the Ameson Foundation.

Valwood School is one of five schools in the 11-state Southern Association of Independent Schools (SAIS) region selected to participate in an exchange program sponsored by SAIS and the Ameson Education and Culture Exchange Foundation.

The Ameson Foundation is a non-profit, non-governmental organization that is committed to the promotion and implementation of educational exchanges in China and abroad. They maintain operation centers in Shanghai, Beijing, Nanjing and Suzhou, a representative office in Washington, D.C., and numerous operation centers worldwide.

“We are in a special kind of program in our school and that is American High School Curriculum,” said Lily. “This is totally new for our school. It is the first year we have this kind of program.”

Fifty percent of the students’ curriculum in Beijing is taught by foreign teachers. Next year, the school hopes to have 70 to 80 percent of the classes taught by foreign teachers.

“They are trying to get Chinese students familiar with the American way,” said Lily.

All five exchange students at Valwood attend Beijing No. 4 High School. Beijing No. 4 is a public beacon high school in Xicheng District of Beijing. The school is known as one of China’s most prestigious academic facilities.

“Our classes are a lot bigger there,” said Leaf. “There are more students in one class.”

The students recognized several differences between their home school in Beijing and Valwood. The biggest difference was the class size. The Chinese students are used to being in a class of 30 or more; at Valwood, their class size is about 12. They also noticed a significant difference in the way lessons are taught.

“Usually, when we have a question in Beijing, we will wait until class is over and then ask,” said Lily. “But here, everyone asks in class.”

The students find that being able to ask questions in class is more helpful when they are trying to learn the lesson. However, this seemingly unusual teaching method is not the first time they have encountered this.

“We have foreign teachers in our school that teach us,” said Lily. “Sometimes, maybe they are familiar with the American way to teach class and they always ask do we have any questions.”

Lily said that even though they are prompted for questions, a lot of them are too embarrassed to ask in front of everyone, so they just wait until after class anyway.

“We are not familiar with this kind of learning,” said Lily.

The students are trying to familiarize themselves with the American way of learning because they all plan to attend American universities.

“The universities in America are a lot busier than the universities in China,” said Leaf. “I think we can learn more in the busier life.”

While the students have been at Valwood, it hasn’t been all work and no play. Each of the students is placed with a host family that has children around their age so they can experience having siblings. This is a huge change for the Chinese students as they are all from one-child families. By law, citizens in China must abide by the family-planning policy which limits each Chinese family to having only one child.

“I love them,” said Hope of her adopted siblings.

Another fascinating experience has been the DVR (Digital Video Recording).

“You can record it on TV and watch it anytime,” said Leaf as she explained how it worked. “You can also skip over the advertisements.”

The students even participate in school, extracurricular activities. Kevin Z., known by the Valwood students as “cool shoes Kevin,” plays on Valwood’s basketball team.

“My favorite part is the basketball,” said Kevin Z.

Kevin Z. also plays on the basketball team for his school in Beijing.

Aside from experiencing American life, the students have gotten a taste for South Georgia life as well. Last Saturday, the students went on an outing to one of the host family’s river houses where they did all of the quintessential Southern things. They went skeet shooting, which Hope found she had a gift for, they rode on a tractor mule, they had a cookout and they even made s’mores.

Valwood Headmaster Dr. Darren Pascavage said having the Beijing students has been an eye-opening experience for the students of Valwood.

“It makes the world seem a little smaller because I think what they found was the students from Beijing were in many ways much like themselves,” said Pascavage.

Pascavage also said Valwood students had their eyes open to the competition that exists for admittance into American universities.

“It was a bit of an eye opener for them to find that there were students from China who are as eager for success and competitive college placement as they were,” said Pascavage. “I think it let them know that there was competition that extends far beyond the United States.”

The exchange students leave Valwood Saturday, Feb. 11, and are flying to Boston, Mass. The students will continue to travel to New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania to tour prestigious universities such as Harvard, Princeton and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

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