Chinese students honored in NYC

Thirty-two outstanding self-financed Chinese overseas students in the eastern US were honored with prestigious government awards in New York on Saturday.

Zhang Qiyue, China’s consul general in New York, presented the students with certificates and scholarships ranging from $6,000 to $10,000.

The students were among 500 winners from 25 countries who were honored for their notable achievements in 2017 with awards recognizing outstanding self-financed students abroad, an annual program sponsored by the China Scholarship Council, a non-profit agency affiliated with China’s Ministry of Education.

“Our nation’s future is in our young people, and the future of China-US relations will be in the hands of today’s young people of both countries,” said Zhang. “Today’s China-US relations are at the crossroads, I hope all of us will strive even harder to enhance mutual understanding between our two countries and to strengthen cooperation between our two nations.

“This year is China’s 40th year of reform and opening up, and I think in China’s development, the external environment is very important, and our relations with the outside world is going to be a very important factor in this development,” said Zhang.

“In these relations with the outside world, the US-China bilateral is the most important bilateral relationship, because this not only impacts our two nations, it will also have a very strong impact on world peace and development.”

Zhang said all students and professors in the US can play an important and unique role in sharing their own experience in China, especially regarding China-US disputes in trade and other areas.

“I deeply feel our country’s encouragement and support for our overseas students and talent,” said MIT post-doctoral student Peng Chenhui, one of four extraordinary potential prize winners. “It’s an unexpected and huge honor for me because I graduated from non big-name universities — I got my PhD from Kent State and my undergraduate school was Qufu Normal University. My hard work has been recognized by my mother nation; it’s really encouraging.”