Home CET ProgramsChinaBeijing Chinese Studies & Service LearningLiving in Beijing

Living in Beijing

Beijing
Campus
Housing, Meals & Chinese Roommates
Extracurriculars & Overnight Excursions
Local Faculty-Led Excursions
Service-Learning & Community Service

Beijing
Frequent visitors to Beijing marvel at the city's constant state of flux. Nothing is as it once was. In recent years, development has touched every corner of the city and Beijing has been rebuilt from the ground up. But questions remain about the price that has been paid for this rapid development and the reality that lies beneath the glossy surface. This program takes advantage of this critical juncture in the history of the city to explore the conflicting realities it now embodies--rapid economic development and its environmental price, an increasingly large disparity between the "haves" and "have-nots", internal legal policies adopted for external consumption. Beijing is a unique and exciting stage from which to explore critical issues of 21st century China.

Campus
Capital Normal University (CNU), a national university located in the central western part of the city, hosts CET's center. With its nearly 10,000 undergraduate students and sizable graduate population, the campus offers a vibrant community of students from both Beijing and other parts of China. As one of China's top 100 key universities, Capital Normal University enjoys investment priority from Beijing municipality. All CET students live with their Chinese roommates in a new, international students' dormitory. Classrooms and faculty offices are also housed in this building, and the campus library is right next door. Students have full access to the academic and residential facilities provided to CNU's larger community.

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Housing, Meals & Chinese Roommates
CET students share rooms with Chinese undergraduates at CNU. Chinese roommates offer language practice, cultural insights and friendship and are continually cited by CET students as “one of the best parts of the program.” All student rooms have a private phone line, a television and a computer with Internet access. Each dormitory floor has a shared kitchen equipped with a sink, a microwave and electric burners. Students take advantage of the abundance of reasonably priced eateries in Beijing and CNU’s several on-campus cafeterias.

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Extracurriculars & Overnight Excursion
The program includes at least one overnight excursion to a location outside of Beijing. The trip may be in conjunction with the program's core course, 21st Century Beijing, and helps students broaden their understanding of China's disparate social and economic landscapes.

CET also arranges a host of weekly lectures, extracurricular classes and activities, including visits to historical and cultural sites in and around Beijing. Most activities involve Chinese roommates and allow students the chance to practice Chinese language skills. In addition, residence staff frequently recruit local experts to enhance visits to sites. A local artist might accompany students on a visit to a modern art gallery, or an historian might give a talk about the history of the Summer Palace. All activities aim to show students a side of China that they might not be able to see on their own.

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Local Faculty-Led Excursions
A unique feature of the program is its emphasis on experiential learning. Each area studies course includes at least three out-of-classroom activities as a part of the course curriculum. Such activities may involve a trip to the former residence of a May 4th Era author, a trip to hear monks chant at a local Buddhist temple or a lecture by a member of a non-governmental organization about local environmental protection efforts. These excursions are led by course faculty and are designed to extend students' learning experience beyond the walls of the classroom.

Service-Learning & Community Service
The program arranges service-learning placements and community service opportunities for interested students. Students can take a service-learning course taught by a faculty, do community service work on their own, or work with the Resident Director to develop a volunteering plan. Previous students have volunteered with disadvantaged children, helped at an AIDS education initiative, interned with a local environmental protection organization, and assisted at a facility for disabled people. Click here for more information about service-learning and community service.