On June 23, 1978, Liu Da, president of Tsinghua University, was making a report to Deng Gong on the work of Tsinghua University, and after listening to the report, Deng Gong frowned and then proposed: I am very much in favor of the increase in the number of international students.
Of course, the main direction is the natural sciences, and we must not only send ten or eight, but also send tens of thousands, which is one of the important ways for our country to improve the level of science and education in a short period of time.
Because the work sent by international students during the Cultural Revolution was interrupted for a long time, it was necessary to resume as soon as possible.
On December 26 of that year, at the exit gate of New York International Airport in the United States, a large number of reporters gathered here, although it was already the cold winter moment, they did not feel cold at all, because this was a big event, and they had to grab the best position to wait for the arrival of the interviewee.
The interviewees they were waiting for were 52 Chinese students sent by the mainland. You know, the arrival of these 52 international students has not only caused great repercussions in the United States, but also attracted the attention of the masses in China.
These people's attitudes towards international students are both positive and negative, and the negative ones are mainly worried that the country has spent a lot of money to let them study, and finally what if they are accustomed to seeing the wonderful world abroad and do not want to come back?
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However, for this issue, Deng Gong said a word that reassured all those who held negative views. This can't help but make people wonder, what did Deng Gong say to dispel the concerns of these people?
And these 52 international students, did they finally come back? What is the significance of their new China?
To tell this story, it goes back to May 20, 1978.
At about 3 a.m. AMERICAN TIME that day, former US President Carter was woken up by the phone, and he was very puzzled, because except for a very critical moment, this situation would not happen.
Carter
And the call was from his assistant from Beijing. Carter asked on the phone what happened? Why call so early? What's the bad news?
The assistant replied that it is not bad news, but the Chinese side wants to ask if you can accept 5,000 Chinese students to study at American universities.
Carter was relieved to hear this, and he told his assistant to ask him to tell him to tell him that not to mention 5,000 students, that is, 100,000 students, I also accepted.
Deng Gong went to France to study in order to find a way to save the country in his early years, so he deeply understood the relationship between international students and modernization.
In 1978, not long after the end of the Cultural Revolution, in order to restore the economy and enhance the country's strength as soon as possible, Deng Gong made important instructions on the study abroad work. He stressed the importance of studying abroad and the need to increase the number of students sent.
At present, the steps taken by the mainland are still too small, we must find a way to speed up the pace, the road must be wide, on the one hand, we must strive to improve the level of the university, on the other hand, we must send people out to study, so that there will be a comparison, to see how strong our own universities are.
Deng Gong also added: You send people out first, don't be afraid to run, run 10%, 20%, and 80%. Don't think that sending students is very expensive, this is very important, the Ministry of Education should study it well, no matter how much it costs, it is worth it! Because of this, this made the first batch of more than 50 people study in the United States a final decision.
Deng Gong also issued instructions: Before the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States, the first students who went to the United States to study must arrive in the United States! Because the itinerary was set in a hurry, in order to save time, the first batch of students studying in the United States were set in Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and other places.
Before going abroad, these scholars also deliberately conducted temporary training at the Beijing Language Institute, and the content of the study was mainly the situation at home and abroad, the discipline to pay attention to when going abroad, the common sense of life abroad, and the relevant regulations for studying abroad, etc. During this period, each of them received seven hundred yuan.
The scholars all made the same choice when they got the money, buying one of the best black coats in the country at the time, the same suits and leather shoes, and handbags.
I don't know, I thought they were people from what department, because this dress almost became their "uniform".
The list of 50 scholars includes 11 from Peking University, 5 from other universities in Beijing, 4 from Shanghai and Tianjin universities, 9 from Tsinghua University, 15 from various ministries and commissions of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the State Council, and 2 from the Beijing factory.
The disciplines distributed by these scholars are also different, they are all concentrated in the science and engineering departments, of which there are 29 people in science, accounting for 58%, engineering has 18 people, accounting for 36%, medicine 2 people account for 4%, agriculture 1 person accounts for 2%, science is the largest, because at that time the domestic situation, the role played by science is undoubtedly huge.
On February 23, 1979, eight American students arrived in Beijing, and the Sino-US plan to send students to study abroad was officially launched, and this is a result that both China and the United States are happy to see.
When it comes to the history of Sending Students from China, it first began after the Opium War.
In 1872, the Qing government decided to take the lead in sending a group of children to the United States under the leadership of Rong Hong to learn advanced knowledge, which became the first initiative of the mainland to study at public expense.
In the next three years, the Qing government successively sent a total of 4 batches of students, a total of 120 people. With the expectations given by the motherland and their own patriotic ideals, these little children went out to study courses, and they also taught courses such as military affairs on their own.
But before long, many people in China had a strong opposition to the matter of studying abroad at public expense. The reason is that they are afraid that they will forget the motherland for too long in a foreign country.
There are also some diehards who are stubborn and self-righteous, saying that I am a heavenly kingdom and go to other countries to learn skills, that is, people who have lost their ancestors.
Moreover, the heavens and the earth are vast, and there is no need to learn from them at all. So in 1881, these international students were called back to China, and this move also led to the abandonment of their studies.
But despite the suspension of their studies, these people later became talents and important figures in military, political, commercial, and economic construction. One of the most famous of these people was Zhan Tianyou, the designer and builder of the first railway on the mainland.
In the following hundred years, the mainland underwent earth-shaking changes, and the situation was turbulent for a hundred years. During this period, many people chose to study abroad independently for the sake of the country and the nation, hoping to learn advanced knowledge concepts abroad and find a way to save the country.
For example, Premier Zhou and Deng Gong, the first generation leaders of the mainland, later contributed their entirety to the construction of new China.
However, there are also some people who choose to stay abroad for their own development after studying abroad because of the weakness of the country.
You know, at that time, the gap between China and the United States in scientific research and economic level was not a little bit, and until now, the mainland is still trying to catch up with the United States. At present, Liu Baicheng, a professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Tsinghua University, is one of the first batch of international students who served as a team leader.
In his recollection, it was described as follows: At that time, I was just in the United States, living in an American home, and I was very surprised to see their seven- or eight-year-old children playing with computers, because I had never seen a computer at that time, let alone operated it, but in the United States even a seven- or eight-year-old child could operate it skillfully.
At that time, I thought that maybe in the future, computers could completely change human life. So I studied computer language with undergraduates, felt sleepy, relied on coffee to refresh, and slept at three or four o'clock every day.
In addition to the computer as a tool, the top scientific research equipment in American universities has also become a cardiotonic agent for these international students to study hard and scientific research.
Liu Baicheng said: Before going abroad, the mainland's optical microscope can only enlarge the structure of some materials by 1,000 times, but in the laboratory of the University of Wisconsin, their electron microscopes can be magnified by 200,000 times, so that the study of the fine structure of materials can bring a great leap forward. So for them, this trip to the United States must be both "eye-opening" and "eye-opening."
They desperately integrated into the school, absorbed a lot of cutting-edge scientific knowledge and thinking, and laid a firm foundation for the scientific research work in China.
At about the same time as they arrived in the United States, Deng Gong's detailed itinerary for his visit to the United States was also determined, and the time was set for January 28 to February 5, 1979.
Speaking of which, the reason why international students came to the United States first was also to pave the way for Deng Gong to visit the United States in the future. As early as December 15, 1978, Woodcock, director of the U.S. Liaison Office in China, issued an invitation.
At that time, some people in the US Congress were not very satisfied with the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States, so US President Carter wanted to help them through Deng Gong's visit to the United States.
Of course, for this visit to the United States, Deng Gong also attached great importance to it, and the invitation issued by Woodcock was not a day, and Deng Gong happily agreed. At the same time, this also surprised and surprised the American side, so they worked harder to publicize the news of Deng Gong's upcoming visit to the United States and its importance to the United States, and also stressed that this was one of the most historic events in the history of the United States.
However, as the saying goes, one family rejoices and the other is sad, which is a good thing for both China and the United States, but it is undoubtedly a very important blow to the KmT on the other side, and at the same time, a small number of anti-China forces in the United States are also very unwilling.
Therefore, as soon as Deng Gong's itinerary for visiting the United States was announced, they immediately took action, and even some agents on the other side of the strait even said that they wanted to "give him a little color to see" when Deng Gong visited the United States.
There was also an anti-China organization in the United States that threatened to do something that Deng Xiaoping would never forget for the rest of his life, and in addition to this, some forces bribed thugs and coerced some people to organize demonstrations in Washington.
Forced by the situation, the PARTY Central Committee decided to send an advance team to the United States first to make detailed arrangements for the protective measures for Deng Gong's follow-up visit to the United States. On 12 January 1979, the advance team flew to the United States. After arriving, China and the United States held their first talks, the main content of which was to ask the United States to commit to security issues.
On the 28th, this day is the Spring Festival of the Chinese lunar calendar, according to the custom of the Chinese people, the first day of the New Year is an important day for families.
The 75-year-old Deng Gong braved the cold winter on this day to embark on the road to the United States. At 4:30 p.m. Eastern Time on the 28th, Deng Gong's special plane arrived at Andrews Air Force Base in Washington, D.C., at this time it was still snowing lightly outside, and Deng Gong and his wife walked out of the cabin very calmly and solemnly.
Waiting outside, in addition to U.S. Vice President Walter Mondale and Secretary of State Cyrus Vance, there are countless journalists and the masses, which include more than 400 overseas Chinese and students.
Amid the cheers of many people, Deng Gong greeted them warmly and then went to the hotel where he was staying. After arriving at the hotel, Deng Gong changed his clothes and went out to a banquet that was not included in the itinerary, which was Brzezinski's family banquet, which was specially set up to entertain Deng Gong's visit to the United States.
After the dinner began, there was a lot of laughter, and Brzezinski also took the opportunity to generously express his opinion: I think Chinese and the French have one thing in common, that is, they will think that their national civilization is superior to all other countries.
Hearing this, Deng Gong reacted quickly and immediately took over his words and said: It should be that in East Asia, Chinese food is the best, but in Europe, French food is the best. This clever answer avoided many key points and won the praise of many people present.
In a foreign country, Mr. and Mrs. Deng Gong also received the first batch of students who came to study in the United States, and Ms. Zhuo Lin, on behalf of Deng Xiaoping, told these students thousands of times: We must study hard, return to China after completing our studies, and then serve the motherland.
The final facts also prove that these 52 people have not lived up to the expectations of Ms. Zhuo Lin and Deng Gong, nor have they lived up to the trust of the people of the motherland, and each of them finally returned to China on schedule, and then shined in their respective fields, until many years later, this group of students still remembers vividly.
By February 5th. Deng Gong is about to conclude his nine-day friendly visit to the United States, during which time he attended nearly 80 talks, 20 banquets, delivered as many as 22 official speeches and 8 meetings with reporters.
In his last speech, Deng Gong said: I came to the United States this time with the friendship of the Chinese people, and then now I am going back with the friendship of the American people, and we very much hope that friends from all walks of life in the United States will come to China to take a look, and China's door will always be open and welcomed to friends.
I also hope that the two peoples can continue to be friendly forever, and China and the United States can jointly safeguard world peace.
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Returning to the group of international students, one of them was named Chen Junliang, who was a professor at Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications and an academician of the two academies.
He once said that the reason why he has these achievements and study abroad experience is inseparable. When he first arrived at the University of California, Berkeley, everything around him was unfamiliar. Fortunately, at that time, many Chinese professors were very concerned about these international students from the mainland, not only studying, but also living.
For example, helping to find a house, driving a car to take them to the supermarket to buy, etc., it can be said that a lot of care has been given in terms of life and learning.
You know, many of these Chinese professors' relatives on the mainland have experienced domestic political movements and have also been impacted, but their feelings for the mainland are still deep.
This affection also infected Chen Junliang, who believes that the best way to serve the motherland is to study hard. Therefore, he became more diligent, did not rest on vacation, and stayed up all night every day to make up for the knowledge of evil.
Another student named Li Zhuxia said: At that time, we were under a lot of pressure, whether it was day or night, either in the research room or on the way to listen to the professor's lectures, any opportunity to learn knowledge would not be missed.
What libraries, laboratories, and computer rooms, these are the permanent residences of our Chinese students. When we think of the high hopes and sustenance of the motherland for us, we will raise the spirit to study in the United States for two years, and it is also the two years with the greatest work intensity.
And the living conditions at that time were also very difficult, although the daily life and study expenses of these international students were provided by the state, but in fact, there was not much foreign exchange in China at that time, these students could save money, and every day at noon they ate the cheapest chicken in the school canteen, so that their classmates and school staff thought that Chinese loved to eat chicken.
And there were 50 of them, and once they went out to buy information, they only had a total of $50 on them.
And they heard that there was a habit of tipping abroad, so they handed over all the money on their bodies to the leader and distributed it uniformly.
For some unnecessary expenses, when they go to the toilet outside, they all make eye contact with each other and line up one by one, just to avoid the embarrassment of being asked for a tip and not having money to give.
Speaking of embarrassment, there was another one, when a professor told the students in class that he had some wonderful NBA tickets, asked them who were interested, $5 per ticket.
In fact, hearing this, these Chinese students also want to go, but $5 is very expensive for them, so they gave up, and then the officials of the Chinese consul in the United States learned about it when they communicated with the students, and said to them: The next time there is such an activity, you will go!
Generous, don't let foreigners think that we Chinese are not interested in anything! You should be more social, more integrated with them, don't be afraid of the cost problem, your expenses will be reimbursed by the state! How can this work without just learning to socialize.
In this way, they completed their studies with a grateful heart for the motherland, they also fulfilled the expectations of the motherland, used the knowledge they learned to build the motherland after returning to China, and cultivated a group of talents.
As of 2017, from the first batch of 50 students to the United States to 2017, the number of students studying abroad reached 608,400, and these batches of international students have also become witnesses of China's opening up and prosperity, and most of them have also chosen to return to the motherland to contribute all their strength.