Mandarin Aspirations : The Business Confucius Institute at the University of Leeds

The Mandarin Aspirations Project

The aim of the BCI’s Mandarin Aspirations Project is to encourage and celebrate the learning of Chinese by sharing the motivations (why study Chinese), study experiences (challenges and rewards) and study outcomes (employability, confidence and intercultural skills) of Chinese language learners.

This video shows some highlights from guest lectures and interviews covering these three themes. On this page you can find lots more blog posts and video clips to browse!

This project provides a platform for Chinese language learners, from beginners to old hands, to share their Mandarin learning journey through different media, such as short videos, profiles or stories.

We hope that these Mandarin Aspirations stories will encourage those of you already studying Chinese, and inspire new learners to join a growing and supportive community of Chinese language enthusiasts in the UK.

Look out for updates in our emails, on Twitter and Facebook, and here on our website.

Making Mandarin skills work for you in your career

Babette Radclyffe-Thomas studied Chinese at the University of Leeds, graduating in 2012. She is now an award-winning freelance journalist.

Read Babette's story

Babette Radclyffe-Thomas, Fashion Journalist and Chinese graduate

An 8-week investment to connect with students

Professor Gary Chambers took the BCI level 1 course to learn some basic Mandarin phrases to use with his Chinese students.

Read Gary's story

Gary wearing a suit and tie, with speech bubbles saying "I teach lots of students from China", "I just wanted to be able to say hello and a few more words and phrases", "learning Mandarin is an investment".

From painter and decorator to HSK 6 and beyond

Richard went from a student lacking confidence in his abilities to a fluent Mandarin speaker who has completed all the HSK exams and now teaches Chinese at Harrogate Grammar School.

Read Richard's story