Jay helping to host conference

When educators in China wanted to develop ties with their colleagues in Taiwan, they turned to Indiana for help.
“I was in Anshan (China) and I was talking with one of their deputy directors, and he had actually gone to Taiwan on a visitation,” recalled Jay Schools Supt. Tim Long.
“He just brought up the fact that it would be really neat if we could have a forum together. They know that I work in Taiwan as well as China, so I told him I thought it was an idea worth pursuing. But he didn’t really have an avenue to make that happen, so I volunteered,” said Long, who has been involved with international educational exchange efforts locally for five or six years.
That was about a year ago.
Later this month at Minnetrista Cultural Center in Muncie, teachers and administrators from both those countries will join their Hoosier counterparts for a global education forum sponsored by Jay Schools, Ball State University, and the school systems of Anshan, China, and Miaoli, Taiwan.
“This is a culminating event to five years of work,” said Long, who stressed that the Oct. 15 through 18 forum will be non-political. “The forum is just a chance to present how we do education. It’s pretty wide-ranging really.”
But he’s well aware that it’s unusual to get colleagues from both mainland China and Taiwan together in the same room for mutual benefit.
“They both use the word ‘historic,’” said Long.
Long’s first foray into China was the result of a grant from the Freeman Foundation. Since then, he’s led multiple exchange trips, building a relationship with the schools in Anshan.
Soon after the China initiative was launched, similar contacts and exchanges were developed with Taiwan.
“We train teachers for both countries,” said Long.
A group of teachers from Taiwan, for example, arrived this week for classroom training in Jay Schools, where they will learn more about American educational methods and interact with American teachers.
The training of teachers from China and Taiwan has also created a small revenue stream that has helped underwrite the school corporation’s international initiatives.
Long said that international teacher training over the past three years has brought in about $125,000 in revenue to Jay Schools. Some of those dollars from the “China fund” will be tapped to help underwrite the costs of the conference. He noted that no public tax revenues will be involved.
Chinese and Taiwanese participants in the conference will pay their own travel and lodging expenses, while conference-related costs will be divided evenly between the Jay Schools “China fund,” the Chinese government and the government of Taiwan.
“It’s a program that stands on its own two feet,” said Long. “The board had asked that we not use public dollars.”
In addition to the international visitors, the conference is expected to involve educators from Ball State University, Muncie Community Schools, Burris Laboratory School, Wes-Del Schools, Randolph Eastern Schools, Randolph Central Schools, Monroe Central Schools, South Adams Schools, Wabash City Schools, Richmond Community Schools, Kokomo Center Schools, Yorktown Schools, Northwestern Shelby Schools, DeKalb County Schools, East Noble Schools and Oxford Community Schools from Michigan.
In all, an estimated 60 educators will be taking part, with 40 to 45 of those from Anshan, China, and Miaoli, Taiwan.
“They want to improve the English schools for their students,” Long said. “They want to improve access to American colleges for their students.”
Long noted that there’s rising interest in attracting international students to the U.S.
“It’s something that many school corporations in Indiana are looking at,” he said, pointing to Kokomo and Oxford, Mich., as leaders in the trend. “I think it would be great if we could get 20 to 30 students a year at the high school or the middle schools from overseas.”[[In-content Ad]]