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Published: June 18th 2012
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Let me make the title more clear...Class of 2009 is when the students started college at WXP. All the grades start with the last 2 digits of the year they entered college, so instead of it being the Class of 2012 like in the US it is Class of 2009. Onto the activities over the last few weeks.
On the evening of May 29th, instead of having my typical night elective class of Oral English I took my students to the Spring Variety Show that kicked off the Graduation Celebrations. My freshman Business English majors were bummed that they had class and couldn't go but a few lucky students are in my elective Oral English class and got to go for class.
I enjoyed watching the students perform and figured it was a great way to have school spirit by supporting the students. The students had 2 weeks to prepare for this event and did a fantastic job.
Then on June 5th, I was notified that the Department of Economics & Trade was having a similar type show as the prior week's show hosted by the Department of Engineering (didn't know this,
thought it was college wide). So I cancelled my night class again and told them all to go watch the performances.
On June 8th, we were invited by the students to a Graduation Banquet for all the Business English graduates, who I taught during the Fall 2010 semester. It was a great evening of socializing, toasting, drinking and singing at the KTV. I got to see all 95+ students, some of who I hadn't seen since December 2010. I was happy to hear that 15 of them will continue their education in the Fall by attending University to obtain their Bachelors Degree in English most in our province but one is going to South Korea to finish her degree.
On June 12th, I was invited to the Department of Biology performance and they had the most talented students of the three performances that I attended. This department even had us teachers give scores to all 17 acts that performed and gave certificates to the highest scores. I must have had good taste as all the groups that I gave high scores to got certificates, sometimes I wonder about the cultural differences in taste but
this proved there weren't any that evening.
On June 15th, was the graduation ceremony which no parents or relatives were invited to and not even all of the students. Seems very different from any graduation ceremony in the US. The room held about 200 people max so the top students from the 20 majors were invited to the ceremony. It was our first graduation that we attended in China and was quite neat to experience, it was only 1 hour long thankfully as the heat and humidity were horrible even at 9am. No caps or gowns were worn and many students wore jeans and t-shirts, quite strange but then again it just shows the lack of importance this event is in their society.
After the ceremony many students had to leave to go to work and even my main contact at my PT job was gone for 1 day for graduation and back at work the next visiably upset about the next stage of life and how there was no adjustment period really. I mean when I graduated college I took 2 months off to relax and travel before I began my move to
San Diego, CA and job search. It is good in a way that such a high percentage 95% or higher have jobs after graduation but they will miss out on the traveling opportunities or time to adjust to their new goals in life.
I hope you enjoy the photos as much as I enjoyed the activities.
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Mom
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graduations
Some of those fashions are very different ! Looks like more great nights for memories!