U.S. official: Study Mandarin Brings Students Bright Future

San Francisco, Oct. 3 (People's Daily Online) —Arnie Roblan is confident. "Our mission is to enhance Oregon as a state that has the largest number of Mandarin learners in America." He told People's Daily Online reporter.

Arnie Roblan is the co-speaker of Oregon House of Representatives. He said in a recent interview that Oregon is dedicate to further promote Mandarin teaching in the state.

For quite a long time, the government, the House of Representatives and the Senate in Oregon has attached great importance to cooperate with China. The state legislature passed a proposal in 2010 for the first time in America to promote Mandarin teaching in all public schools by establish Confucius Schools. Mandarin learning enthusiasm has become common practice in the state especially since 2011, when Chinese State Councilor Liu Yandong visited Oregon state in April.

"The future of Sino-US relations depend on the younger generation between the two countries," said Roblan, "We learn from each other so that we understand each other." Roblan argued that American students who are capable of speaking Mandarin have a more "bright future". He introduced that currently, there are 18 Confucius Classrooms in Oregon and this number is expected to reach 25 at the end of this year.

"The achievement of this goal will attract more students and Oregonian to learn Chinese." Roblan said.

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