Education: Chinese students in US, American students in China

Lincoln High School students are well prepared to welcome President Xi Jinping when he visits the school in Tacoma, Seattle. [Photo/China Daily]

President Xi is expected to visit Lincoln High School in Tacoma, Seattle, on his trip to the US. Bilateral education exchanges between China and US have been growing with the multiple arrays of preferential visa policies for Chinese students to study in US rolled out since the late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping signed an education cooperation document on his visit to the US in 1979.

Nowadays "studying in America" has become a popular plot in Chinese movies and TV dramas like My Sunshine, and American dreams in China. At the early stages of China's reform and opening-up drive, which was started in 1978, most Chinese students went to further their studies in the US at public expenses, but now more students go to the US with private funding either from their parents or by themselves.

Chinese enrollments at US colleges. by SinoVisionNet

Chinese enrollment in US reached a record high of 274,493 in 2014, topping all other countries as a source for foreign students, according to Max Baucus, US Ambassador to China.

On the other hand, China is also among the top five destination countries for American students what want to study abroad. A total of 14,413 American students came to study in China between 2012 and 2013. By summer this year, altogether 100,000 American students have come to study in China.