The Confucius Institute in Auckland is delighted to announce the winners of the 16th Chinese Essay Competition (2022). Congratulations to all the winners, especially Colden Sapir from ACG Parnell College, who claimed the top prize — Chinese Ambassador’s Trophy. Amazingly, it is the second time that Colden has had his name engraved on the trophy. Chinese Ambassador to New Zealand, Wang Xiaolong, presented the trophy to Colden at the National School Chinese Celebration on Sept 24 in Auckland.

The Chinese Essay Competition was started in 2007 when the Confucius Institute was launched in New Zealand. It has been receiving continuous participation from thousands of young Kiwi Chinese learners, also support from their teachers and families. In the past sixteen years, the competition has been kindly endorsed by the Chinese ambassadors to New Zealand and is titled the “Chinese Ambassador’s Trophy”.

Again, after 2021, the competition received generous sponsorship from the Bank of New Zealand. Mr Franky Wang, head of BNZ’s Asia Business Activation, attended the event and presented the prize.

The certificates of the winners will be posted to their schools when the new term starts next week.

Winners’ List 获奖名单

Ambassador’s Trophy

Junior Secondary Category

First Prize

Second Prize

Third Prize

WILLIAM SOK Student Rotorua Boys High School “We’re able to practice our Chinese speaking abilities in more ways than one, you know, because we have to engage with an audience, make sure that they laugh, which is pretty hard to do in a language that we’re not completely familiar with, right?”

Among the audience was China’s Ambassador to New Zealand who was suitably impressed by the various performances.

DR. WANG XIAOLONG Chinese Ambassador to New Zealand “I was so amazed by the level of proficiency achieved by some of the boys and girls.”

And for many students it’s an opportunity to build the foundation for a future career.

JOSHUA SMITH Student Rotorua Boys High School “I definitely want to work overseas as a businessman, so Chinese will be a very useful skill to have, especially with talking to more people.”

And as New Zealand celebrates 50 years of diplomatic relations with China in 2022, the Ambassador says Chinese Language Week lays a foundation for the next fifty years.

DR. WANG XIAOLONG Chinese Ambassador to New Zealand “With the knowledge about the language and the culture with the friends they make, I think they will make wonderful ambassadors of the people between the two countries.”

The popular Chinese Bridge speech competition is coming back. This year, in the secondary school category of Auckland’s regional final, we received nearly 80 registrations from 25 schools in Auckland, Hamilton and Whangarei. 63 of them submitted their recorded speech video.

According to the judges’ feedback, watching all the videos is a delightful experience. “The overall quality of the speeches is impressive. I see crouching tigers and hidden dragons in the Mandarin teaching and learning field in the Auckland area.”

However, making the decision is not easy. Twelve students from 11 schools have been selected as the finalists for the Auckland regional final, which will be held virtually on June 19. We congratulate the finalists and all the participants.

More news about the Chinese Bridge will be updated.

Following a long career at the University of Auckland, including seventeen years serving as the director of Confucius Institute in Auckland, Nora Yao announced her retirement from the CI and University effective this week.

Nora graduated from Shanghai International Studies University in China and moved to New Zealand in the early 1980s. After receiving her MA at UOA, she joined the Arts faculty and started a career as senior tutor in Chinese. In the past thirty years, she provide courses like Advanced Modern Chinese, Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language, etc., and is the co-author of the Chinese language textbooks, Fundamental written Chinese (2009) and Fundamental spoken Chinese (2009). She is the council member of the International Society for Chinese Language Teaching （世界汉语教学学会）and a member of its expert panel of International Chinese Teaching Materials Development.

In 2005, the University of Auckland signed an MOU with China’s Ministry of Education to establish the country’s very first Confucius Institute on the campus. Nora has been taking the role of director since then, which made her the longest-serving CI director world-widely. Under her leadership, the Confucius Institute in Auckland has been recognized as one of the best CIs in the world and a Global Model CI, with numerous awards and many pioneering projects in facilitating Chinese language learning in New Zealand. Her contribution has been acknowledged with a ‘Distinguished Teaching Award’ from the University of Auckland and ‘Valued Contribution to the University Award’ by the Vice-Chancellor of the University twice, and an ‘Outstanding Contribution Award’ by Confucius Institute Headquarters. She was awarded a ‘Good Citizen Award’ and a ‘Medal for Distinguished Women in Auckland’ from the Mayor of Auckland for her local community service.

Nora Yao has been a legend for her contribution and achievement in the field of Chinese language teaching in New Zealand, also a bridge-builder in fostering dialogue and mutual understanding between the peoples of New Zealand and China.

Her legacy will continue. The Chinese language teaching in New Zealand will flourish.

We wish Nora all the best and happy retirement!

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Welcome Dr Xuelin Zhou – New CI Director

Dr Xuelin Zhou has been appointed as the new director of the Confucius Institute by the University of Auckland. As Nora’s successor, he has started his new role this month.

Xuelin is an Associate Professor in Media and Screen at the University of Auckland. His research interests cover popular culture in East Asia and Chinese-language film. A brief bio of him is available on Our Team page.

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