Wintec managers visit China

Three Wintec managers recently returned from China where they visited five vocational schools in the Guangdong Province and one university in Sichuan province.

Three Wintec managers recently returned from China where they visited five vocational schools in the Guangdong Province and one university in Sichuan province.

Director of Centre for Languages Jo Thomas; Team Manager of Centre for Languages Laura Haseley; and Head of School of Information Technology Klaus Reiter visited the schools as part of Wintec’s ongoing recruitment of international students.

CHINESE VISIT: Jo Thomas and Laura Haseley in the background at one of the vocational school  visits
CHINESE VISIT: Jo Thomas and Laura Haseley in the background at one of the vocational school visits Photo: Klaus Reiter

The trip enabled the three managers to visit prospective students and test their English skills to see if they were prepared for study at Wintec.

Along with this, their trip enabled them to build further relationships with the five schools.

Reiter said his main goal was to discuss possible pathways into Information Technology as most Chinese students currently enrol in the School of Business.

“The vocational schools we visited are state of the art, their equipment is modern. What makes them different is their size, 1000 – 5000 students.

“Their classes are larger than ours.”

Thomas said the trip was a great success.

“International education is an important part of what we do and who we are. Thinking and acting globally is integral to our work and this trip was an opportunity to strengthen existing relationships and to help build new ones.

“It is a great opportunity to share tertiary teaching experiences across East and West and to genuinely learn from one another’s cultures.”

Thomas said the expectation was that a number of the students might begin study with Wintec in July. Several delegations from the vocational schools and from Chengdu University have visited Wintec in the past few years. Included in these delegations have been Chinese lecturers who travelled to New Zealand to study adult teaching styles at Wintec.