Students in Sydney public schools will soon be interacting with and learning from their counterparts in China under an agreement between the department’s Sydney region and an education authority in China’s Yangzhou city.

Sydney regional director, Phil Lambert, and Yangzhou Municipal Education Bureau deputy director general, Chenglan Kuang, signed the memorandum of understanding in a small ceremony held earlier this term at the department’s Bridge Street headquarters.

Among the guests were a delegation from Yangzhou as well as department staff and secondary students from NSW public schools.

Dr Lambert said the agreement was part of the region’s Expanding Horizons with Asia initiative, which has been developed to assist students in understanding contemporary Asia.

He said staff and students from almost 230 public schools in the Sydney region would benefit from the strategic partnership by being able to access expert Mandarin language tuition and gain a greater appreciation of how China operated economically and culturally.

“Schools in Sydney will form sister-school links with schools in Yangzhou allowing students from both countries to communicate and learn more about each other,” Dr Lambert said.

“Teachers will be able to gain insight into the changing economic circumstances and cultural developments in China to enrich lessons. This will benefit schools through enhanced curriculum content in areas such as economics, business studies, the arts and languages and cultural exchanges.”

The memorandum also includes the development of training programs to support the work of school leaders and teachers in Sydney and Yangzhou, Dr Lambert said.

Yangzhou is located just north of Shanghai in the Jiangsu province. It has a population of five million with about 3,000 schools and 60 universities.

Ms Kuang said the memorandum was the first step towards a “fruitful exchange”.

“We are of the opinion that such cooperation will greatly benefit the development of educational services for both parties,” she said.

According to department statistics, China makes up the largest proportion of students (almost 38,000 or 18.2 per cent in 2007) with a language background other than English in NSW public schools. Similarly, 48 per cent of all international feepaying students at NSW public schools come from China.

Trevor Fletcher, the department’s deputy director-general (schools), said the connection between the two regions would go towards building the capacity for students to sustainably learn Asian languages and culture. “The world is a global village and an increasing number of our current students will end up working and sometimes living in other countries such as China,” Mr Fletcher said. “It is important we better understand and prepare for that and move from a situation where many of our students are monolingual.”

A memorandum of understanding signed last year between Western Sydney region and China’s Ningbo Municipal Education Bureau has resulted in a five-year scheme where each year up to 10 Chinese educators will work voluntarily in the region’s schools to promote and support the Mandarin language.

“Having trained teachers coming out for a voluntary posting … helps enormously,” Mr Fletcher said.

“Not only are the students getting greater access to real experts – the more students we train … in foreign languages, the more are likely to … themselves become qualified language teachers.”