austraLasia
1541
Zhejiang Uni,
Hangzhou: China-Italy symposium on
education
HANGZHOU (PRC): 27th April
2006 -- In what amounted to a significant meeting of great minds, one
of the People's Republic of China's top ten universities hosted a symposium on
education last week, drawing on Chinese and European educationalists and their
experience in a variety of fields: education, communication, sociology - but
holding it together in a very real sense was the educational tradition of one
John Bosco, of Valdocco, Turin.
The symposium was seen as
part of the interchange between the Chinese academic world and the rest of the
world. Its significance lay in the meeting of two worlds, something that
had not escaped even John Bosco who, speaking of China and his vision of world
expansion, at one point compared the great to-do involved with running affairs
in tiny Valdocco with the challenge to be faced in China 'where there were 500
million people' [sic] (Barberis, Cronichetta, 20 May
1875).
From the Chinese side, with its impeccable
organisation and warm welcome, there were Professor Xu Ziaozhou, Deputy Dean of
the College of Education, Zhejiang University, but also representative
professors from Tsinghua University (Beijing), Beijing Normal University, East
China Normal University (Shanghai), Zhejiang Normal University. There was
also a Professor from Chengking University of Tainan
(Taiwan).
From Europe, Professor Robert Giannatelli,
former President of Salesian University, Director of Development Office,
President of MED (Italian Association for education to Media and Communication),
Professor Guglielmo Malizia, Deputy Dean, Department of Education, Head of
Sociology of the Education Institute, Salesian University, Professor Carlo
Nanni, Vice President, Professor Pier Cesare Rivoltella, Director of the Masters
Degree in Communication and Education, Catholic University of Milan, Professor
Carlo Socol, Professor of Church History, Holy Spirit College of Hong Kong,
Professor Jacques Schepens, Faculty of Theology Benediktbeuern (Germany), a
visiting professor at Salesian University Rome. There were others of the
same ilk.
Topics covered included Media education and
China - what can educational technologists do? Empirical study of problems
of social education in Taiwan; Community education in China. Participants
heard of the history of Christian education in China and also of the history of
the Valdocco Oratory and its contribution now in one hundred years of activity
in China.
The symposium highlighted the value
of people who can both think globally and act locally. The Salesian
University in Rome has awarded a scholarship to a student from Zhejiang
University to write a dissertation in Rome for one year under the direction of
Prof. Malizia. The HK Don Bosco Charitable Foundation (represented by its
president Mr John Wong) pledged some scholarships for deserving students of the
College of Education.
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