U.S.-China Student-to-Student Dialogue

The 21st Century China Center (21CCC) at UC San Diego’s School of Global Policy and Strategy announces the U.S.-China Student-to-Student Dialogue (STSD), a new initiative to promote exchange and dialogue on critical issues in the U.S.-China relations, bring together Chinese and American university students. Participating universities for STSD include UC San Diego and Georgetown University in the U.S. and Peking University and Fudan University in China.

In the 2023-24 academic year, the STSD involves student-led virtual meetings in the fall and winter quarters, culminating in an all-expenses-paid trip to Hong Kong in late May or early June that will feature in-person dialogues, project presentations, and interactions with local students, scholars, and officials. The program will also include site visits.

This year’s overarching theme will be: "What responsibility do the U.S. and China have towards the Global South?" Student will engage dialogues and collaborate on projects covering various topic areas within this theme, including climate change, global health, development assistance, food security and/or trade.

The Dialogue has its origin in the Georgetown Initiative for U.S.-China Dialogue, which has previously organized both in-person and virtual student-to-student dialogues between Georgetown students and peers from leading Chinese universities. Building on the success of the Georgetown Initiative, the expanded program in 2023-24 will feature a year-long, multi-modal dialogue among students from the four American and Chinese universities mentioned above.

Throughout the 2023-24 academic year, participants from the four universities will convene virtually via Zoom for six sessions, each lasting 90 minutes (please refer to the tentative timeline and schedule below). Within each Zoom session, students will work in smaller groups to foster in-depth dialogues and create joint projects, all centered around the designated topic areas. These sessions will commence with a general introduction to the roles of the U.S. and China in the Global South.