STILLPOINT Archive: last updated 11/11/2015
Meetings with public intellectuals, exploration of a world power’s geopolitics, and visits to extraordinary cultural sites were among highlights of May’s “Gordon Getaway” trip through China for a group of Gordon friends led by President Michael Lindsay and Rebecca Lindsay. As Gordon welcomes increasing numbers of students from China each year, the nine-day trip was an opportunity for Gordon constituents to better understand the nation’s cultural, educational, and economic landscape and how it relates to the mission of the College. The College is especially grateful to Gordon parent Dan Wright, founder of GreenPoint Group, who lent his decades of experience building bridges between U.S. and China-based corporations to help make this trip a success.
In Beijing the group celebrated the release by Peking University Press of President Lindsay’s 2014 book View from the Top in a Chinese language edition. The book’s release was marked with a leadership forum featuring two Chinese executives and two American executives—including Dante Rutstrom ’80, the head of Eastman’s Asia-Pacific business.
The group met Chinese public intellectuals including Victor Yuan, the head of China’s largest public polling firm (who spoke at Gordon in 2013); Dr. Henry Wang, the head of a large think tank and an official counselor to the Chinese political leadership; and Xin Hao, a leader in China’s burgeoning environmental activism community.
At the Shanghai headquarters of Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation, Stephanie (Cheung) Oshchepkov ’07 of SMIC’s investor relations team led a tour of SMIC’s state-of-the-art manufacturing site. Afterward, the group visited the SMIC international school to learn about secondary education in China. In Beijing, the group intersected one night with 11 Gordon students and Professor Stephen Smith, who were visiting the second of six cities in Gordon’s China Seminar.
Recently, along with 14 other college presidents and national educational leaders, President Lindsay was appointed to the 100,000 Strong Foundation’s Academic Advisory Council. 100,000 Strong, a bipartisan nonprofit endorsed by both the U.S. and Chinese governments, encourages students of diverse backgrounds from across the U.S. to learn Mandarin and study in China.
