11 May 2020
Cambridge Assessment English delivered a major festival for Chinese educators online, which attracted over 15,000 participants.
The event, which was held completely online, brought together academics, policy makers and educators to look at the future of language education and learning. The Festival was divided into three parts which were: The AI Empowered Learning, How to teach English online – MOOC China and Beyond, and the Cambridge English Conference 2020. The theme of this year’s Cambridge English Conference was ‘For every learner every step of the way’. Over 1000 delegates joined the conference which included contributions from Cambridge experts and key institutions such as Beijing Foreign Studies University, Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, Chongqing University and the British Council.
We’ve all had to pull together and show incredible resilience, adaptability and collaboration to ensure education continues.
Francesca Woodward, Chief Executive of Cambridge Assessment English opened the conference.
"We have all faced tremendous challenges and disruption this year due to Covid-19, but we’ve seen some inspiring collaboration in the sector that has helped education continue", explained Woodward. She continued: "We’ve all had to pull together and show incredible resilience, adaptability and collaboration to ensure education continues. I’ve seen great examples of how China has adapted to the crisis. I am full of admiration for the way in which the country has responded to unprecedented challenges, and I am inspired by Chinese educators who have met these challenges head on and managed to continue to educate their learners".
Min Qu, Director Asia Pacific at Cambridge Assessment English looked at how the ecosystem of English language education has proved robust, despite the severe disruption caused by Covid-19. She also looked at some of the inspiring responses she has seen from the language teaching profession. Dr Nick Saville covered Ecosystem, Impact and the Future under the current global pandemic. Sue Trory, Global Head of Adult and Higher Education and Jennifer Zhang, Head of Business Development in China – gave an insightful presentation into how Linguaskill is really making an impact around the world.