From November 14 to 16, the 2025 World Chinese Language Conference was held at the China National Convention Center in Beijing. Hosted by the Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic of China, the conference was jointly organized by the Center for Language Education and Cooperation, the Chinese International Education Foundation, and the International Society for Chinese Language Teaching. Centered on the theme of “Innovation Leads, AI Empowers: Learning Chinese Without Borders,” the conference brought together participants from across China and abroad. Yao Lingzhen, Vice President of Shanghai University of Finance and Economics (SUFE) was invited to attend the conference and spoke at the seminar “Building a Borderless Chinese Learning Ecosystem Through Online and Offline Integration” on November 15.
This seminar was one of the parallel sessions of the conference. A total of 11 representatives from China, Armenia, France, Ethiopia, and other countries engaged in in-depth discussions. Yu Tianqi, Deputy Director of the Center for Language Education and Cooperation attended the seminar and delivered remarks.
On the topic of “Pathway Exploration and Model Transformation of Smart Chinese Language Teaching under Human-AI Collaboration,” Vice President Yao, drawing on SUFE’s distinctive strengths and practices in intelligent education, gave a systematic introduction to the transformation of higher education and teaching models in the context of human-AI collaboration. She noted that, with the deepening of global economic integration, Chinese has become an important medium of communication in the field of international finance and economics. At the same time, advances in digital technology and human-AI collaboration have created new opportunities for the development of international Chinese language education. She emphasized that SUFE has consistently integrated international Chinese language education with the cultivation of finance and economics talent, forming a distinctive model that combines language, disciplinary expertise, and culture. She also introduced the university’s ongoing efforts to advance smart Chinese teaching and digital transformation through the “Chinese + Digital and Intelligent Economy” Research Center, jointly established with the Center for Language Education and Cooperation, and supported by the university’s Kuangshi Large Model AI platform for the integration of education and research.
During the conference, Vice President Yao also met with members of the delegation from the Confucius Institute at Tallinn University in Estonia for in-depth exchanges on the joint development of the Confucius Institute. In an on-site interview with China Daily, the foreign director of the Confucius Institute at Tallinn University said that concepts such as “human-AI collaboration” and “borderless learning ecosystems” presented at the conference had been highly inspiring. She noted that the institute plans to work with SUFE to introduce intelligent teaching tools and digital learning resources into everyday teaching, helping Chinese learning break through the limits of time and space, enabling more learners to build bridges to economic cooperation with China through the Chinese language, and injecting new vitality into friendly exchanges between China and Estonia.
Vice President Yao’s participation in the conference not only showcased SUFE’s distinctive practices in smart education, but also injected fresh momentum into the development of the “Chinese + Digital and Intelligent Economy” Research Center and broadened its avenues for cooperation. Guided by the conference theme of “Innovation Leads, AI Empowers,” the research center will focus on the core topic of Chinese as an international communication medium for the digital and intelligent economy. By integrating the university’s multidisciplinary strengths in economics and management, digital technology, and language education, the center will systematically carry out research on topics including integrated teaching models for “Chinese + Digital and Intelligent Economy,” the development of digital Chinese teaching resources, and language services for cross-border cooperation in the digital and intelligent economy, with a view to providing both theoretical support and practical solutions for the deeper integration of international Chinese language education and digital-intelligence-driven economic development.
(From: International Cultural Exchange School)
Translated by: ZHANG Yahan
