When students in the Associated Colleges of China Program take the "pledge," the room falls silent. They sign on a dotted line and agree to speak only Chinese during their semester in China. That means Chinese with their instructors, Chinese with visitors and Chinese with each other — even if they are friends or dorm mates back on the Hill.
"Taking the pledge was the scariest day of my life," Sean Navin '07 recalls. It was also, he says, what made him a capable speaker of Chinese, one able to get around by himself throughout that vast country. The pledge forced him not only to speak but to think in Chinese.
ACC is at the heart of Hamilton's Chinese language program, and by extension is critical to the Asian studies concentration as well. Accepted students are placed at the level appropriate for their language ability; they then spend one or two semesters in intensive language and cultural study in Beijing. "Most of the materials are about the culture, for instance the single-child policy," William R. Kenan Professor Hong Gang Jin says. "I believe in learning the culture through language. It's the most direct and most meaningful way."
Jin was a founder of ACC in 1996 and serves as director today. Hamilton administers the program, but the 50 students who enroll each term come from schools across the country. The curriculum is specifically designed for ACC students and is taught by three dozen Chinese instructors hired just for the program.
The program involves intense study: At least four hours a day are spent in class, often one-on-one with the instructor, and about the same amount of time goes into preparing for each day's sessions. Students take field trips throughout China and spend weekends with host families. For their final research papers, they are required to interview sources in Chinese. The topics of recent papers reveal a high level of confidence in their verbal abilities: the state of Buddhism in China, the changing role of women in modern Chinese society and the status of Chinese Christians, to name a few. Many of the ACC students say their time in Beijing was the most difficult and most rewarding part of their college education.
ACC is complemented by several other growing Asian study-abroad programs with which Hamilton is affiliated:
