A British Student from the Confucius Classroom at Bohunt School Entered the National Chinese Speech Contest Final

On 7th February 2018, Harry Linegar, a Year 10 student from the Confucius Classroom at Bohunt School, accompanied by Hanban teacher Li Jia and local teacher Zeng Bin, went to London to take part in the National Chinese Speech Contest Final, hosted jointly by the British Council and HSBC.

Prior to the competition, Wang Yongli, Ministerial Counsellor for the Education Department of the Chinese Embassy in the UK, Sir Ciarán Devane, Chief Executive of the British Council, chatted with the participants and shared their experience in foreign language learning.

Bohunt School is the first state secondary school in the UK to offer Chinese immersion in education. Since the Confucius Classroom was established in collaboration with the Confucius Institute at the University of Southampton (CI Soton) in 2013, it has received strong support from the Confucius Institute Headquarters and CI Soton and has drawn wide social attention in China and Britain, as well as from the Chinese and British media. The school has achieved a 100% pass rate in their Chinese GCSE results for three consecutive years with 80% A and A+ grades.