A student exchange between Connecticut and Shandong is scheduled for Friday, November 4, 2005. Eight students and two teachers from Zibo Teaching Academy Affiliated Primary School will be hosted by Franklin Elementay School and Union Elementary School, November 4-18. The exchange represents the first students from Shandong Province to visit their partner school(s) in Connecticut since the partnership program was initiated in 2004.
Shandong Commissioner of Education, QI Tao, completed a visit to Connecticut, including high ranking municipal and provincial education officials from Qingdao and Jinan on October 28, 2005. The delegation visited historical sites and archival collections related to the history between China and Connecticut, visited Myrtle Stevens Elementary School in Rocky Hill, Lewis S. Mills High School and Har-Bur Middle School in Burlington, and signed education renewal agreement between the Shandong Department of Education and the Connecticut State Department of Education. China delegation participants from schools having partnerships or seeking partnerships in the near future in Shandong Province attended the renewal agreement signing including Hillcrest Elementary School in Wethersfield and Metropolitan Learning Center in Bloomfield.
At the renewal agreement signing at 3:00 on Friday, October 28, Commissioner Betty J. Sternberg appointed Daniel W. Gregg as the Connecticut education liaison to Shandong Province and Commissioner Qi appointed Huang Qi as the Shandong education liaison to Connecticut. Huang Qi is Deputy Commissioner of Education for the Shandong Provincial Education Department and Daniel W. Gregg is Social Studies Consultant and Director of the Connecticut-Shandong School Partnership Project.
Commissioner Qi announced a professional development program on teaching methods to be funded by the Shandong Provincial Education Department pending final approval. Twenty teachers will come to Connecticut in May 2006 for cultural enrichment, professional development on teaching methods and an internship/homestay experience with Connecticut partner schools.
Commissioner Sternberg also announced the projected expansion of school partnerships to 56 by April 2006 through funding from the Freeman Foundation and other programs supported by the Chinese Ministry of Education and local school district support.
Also, announced was the participation of 12 principals in Connecticut and 12 in Shandong Province in a Principal Shadowing Program. The program is supported by the Freeman Foundation, the China Education Association for International Exchange, the China Exchange Initiative, and the Connecticut Principals' Center.
The Freeman Foundation will fund ten new partnerships between Shandong and Connecticut in April 2006. The ten Connecticut schools have already been selected and will begin their preparation in January and February 2006. By April 2006, Connecticut will have 56 partnerships in Shandong Province.
In 1986 Connecticut established a trade agreement with Shandong Province, Peoples' Republic of China. In 2003 the Connecticut State Department of Education signed an education agreement with Shandong Province. This site is primarily used to prepare delegations for field study or the establishment of partner schools in China.
