UNNC Exchange Student Spokesman and Partner Day

Representing the UNNC as an Exchange Student Spokesman: compromise and opportunities

The UNNC Global Engagement Office (GEO) released a program that brings the opportunity for students that are open-minded, enthusiastic in Chinese culture and the UNNC, and with a passion in communication, to promote their experiences with other people as a spokesman of the UNNC.

To apply, us, candidates, had to showcase our strengths for this position. I highlighted my comfort in public speaking and in front of a camera, like when I recorded my winter vacations (you can read about it here), hosted a singing competition at the UNNC (Wonderful Us 2023), assisted interviews as a UNNC Global Ambassador by the UNNC to share my experience in China, or took part in several UNNC Marketing photo shoots and video shoots. I also shared with them times when I discussed my views on Chinese culture on written communications such as articles and posts in several platforms like Instagram, WeChat, or LinkedIn.

After each candidate showed their aptitude for the program, I passed as one of the 6 exchange student spokespeople for the UNNC! Let’s now see what was one of my most memorable responsabilities under this position.

UNNC Partner Day

During the UNNC Partner Day I fulfilled my most important responsability as a UNNC Spokesman: sharing with partner institutions and other UNNC departments about my experience at the UNNC and in China. This day has the goal of strengthening bonds and forging new connections between institutions, therefore it was an honour for me to contribute to the cause by talking about my experience to Shanghai Jiao Tong University, University of Southern California, University of Glasgow, Boston University, Xiamen University, City University of Hong Kong Dongguan, Loughborough University, Bocconi University… (these are some I can remember, but the room was filled with representatives!). As such, I prepared a presentation covering key aspects of my time in China, from the UNNC Welcoming Week, to cultural activities, opportunities on campus, my associations and clubs, sports, and friendships.

Talking about the Welcoming Week at the UNNC

I like to keep my material for the presentations, like the PowerPoint, really light word-wise and, if possible, to keep only pictures and some keywords around. Besides, I also included a small clip from my video of the winter vacations in China, so the talk turned even more enjoyable.

After a small introduction of myself (as a reminder for newcomers: as of 2023-2024, a Spanish year 3 Cybersecurity Engineering exchange student at the UNNC), I began talking about the welcoming week and about how the UNNC gave us, new students, the opportunity to experience the Chinese culture and learn about Ningbo without any time to lose. There was a welcoming dinner during which I met my first group of friends, and then there were some trips to learn about Ningbo’s history at places like Tianyi Ge 天一阁, the oldest archive in China and small museum to 麻将 Mahjong’s history.

Top right picture: welcoming dinner with new friends. Rest: visit to 天一阁 Tianyi Ge (the picture at the Mahjong statue is my favourite!!!)

I added how the cultural activities did not stop there and that, throughout the two semesters, the UNNC kept on organising activities (both for international students and mainland students) to learn about and get involved in Chinese culture (check out my winter vacations video for a glimpse of this!). Furthermore, I had plenty of evidence to show the partner institutions that us, students, were provided with opportunities to get involved in campus life, such us the time I helped host a singing competition (UNNC Wonderful Us 2023), volunteered to represent Spain (both semesters!) during global culture fairs, or joined associations to help mainland Chinese students practise their oral English skills (among the best choices I have made on campus).

When talking about one’s experience on campus, we cannot forget about academics! I offered examples to the attendees of the projects I had developed while studying at the UNNC and I confessed that, indeed, they had been the largest projects I had ever completed in my university life so far; not in the sense of “oh-my-god-this-is-too-much-I-cannot-handle-it-this-is-punishment”, but in the sense of self-accomplishment and how I had been able to thoroughly implement in-depth projects where teachers gave me the opportunity to both use every piece of given knowledge and to build upon it, like with the test harness I developed for Software Quality Assurance, my favourite module, or my solution using semaphores to a producers-consumers problem for the Operating Systems and Concurrency module.

Nonetheless, where I put a lot of emphasis on, specifying how this had been one of the most impactful, if not the most impactful, choices I had made on this campus was joining sport clubs. As one may have seen on some of my social media (albeit I do not post a lot, I may post about meaningful things to me), I joined two clubs: the UNNC’s Karate club and the UNNC’s Kendo club. It was in the latter, in kendo, that I made my core friend group (in fact, I travelled with my friends from kendo to Japan (❁´◡`❁) ); most importantly, I met people that wanted to learn about my culture while also showing me about their (Chinese) culture. This really made me happy because, as I argued during my speech, not everybody wants to meet new people, and that is totally understandable. There are people out there that are complacent with their friend group / connections and do not want to expand it; however, there are also people out there that see the opportunity to learn about a different culture and will take it immediately, just as I do. Therefore, the true challenge is finding these people; once you find them, though, you are reminded of how worth it the effort is and of how valuable these connections, lifelong, are.

Almost all the Kendo team during a team-bonding barbecue together at 东钱湖 DongQian Lake. 哎呀~太好吃的鸡腿。。。

Thus, I reached my main point and my goal with the presentation: the UNNC provided an environment rich with opportunities for cultural exchange, enabling me to meet people who shared my enthusiasm for learning about different cultures, making my experience unforgettable. Naturally, my will to seek out these opportunities also played a role.

I was the last spokesman to present, and I feel confident that I successfully shared to the invited parties this feeling of connection to a new culture and of gratitude towards the opportunities (countless of them brought by the UNNC) that I chose to take up while here in China. I know that this enthusiasm, this energy, of sharing my views regarding a new culture will not fade away, and I am excited to see how I keep on doing this in the near future.

Thank you UNNC for entrusting me to communicate with other institutions under the role of a Exchange Student Spokesman; it made for a nice reflection on my trajectory at the UNNC and China.

Regards,
Saul FG