Comparative Education Bulletin - Faculty of Education - The ...

•
•
•
•
Collaborating, to a certain extent, in the fields of science and
technology. The degree and importance of this collaboration
though should not be overestimated, as the level of science in
the Russian and Chinese provinces bordering each other was
far from being world class, and the collaboration was typically
one way, i.e. seeking any possible technologies for Chinese
industries. The scholars, however, laid the groundwork for
trust by successfully completing many projects, usually in
the fields of natural sciences, like geology. The universities
administered the projects, not the research institutions
because the latter was closed for outsiders or were simply
unskilled in running international projects.
Obtaining experience in ‘traditional’ student exchange
activities. These included widening the number of the
institutions allowed to place participants of government
sponsored exchange programs, as well as new experiences
in partnerships between departments, sending and receiving
students under credit transfer agreements.
Having assigned research tasks to study and re-evaluate each
other’s educational systems: these two countries were once
historically close due to borrowings by the ‘younger brother’
(China) from the ‘older brother’ (USSR);
Increasing overall awareness in both of the societies that
mutual exchange-based programs will positively contribute to
the welfare and economy of both countries.
In other words, the institutional leaders were (and are) comparing
what was going on with each other. This comparison was not
scientifically based, as the scholarship and scale of comparative
education is, as yet, hardly to be found anywhere in the Northeast
China (except the well-known centre in Shenyang), and is completely
missing in the Far East of Russia. However, this comparison,
undertaken by people who are certainly skilled in their fields, laid a
step-by-step, firm foundation towards the realization for a need to
collaborate closely and more productively, setting up new goals and
having more valuable outputs. As a university Vice-President in Russia
pointed out:
We were going along in understanding what we really needed to
get from each other. This experience-based sort of study helped [both
sides] to uncover some specific features, where mutual replacements
and fillings could be made. In other words, each of the parties has
77