Preparing the next Generation of China’s Computer Scientists: A Snapshot of Challenges for Sino-foreign Computer Science Education

The first Sino-foreign higher education institution (SFHEI) opened in China over ten years ago, and was followed by a number of others, all offering opportunities to the local Chinese student population to not just experience a foreign education style, but also earn a foreign degree and, in some cases, study overseas as part of their student life. The experiences for students (and faculty) at these institutions were not without difficulty, and a number of obstacles had to be overcome, especially in the early years. As time has passed, and these institutions have become more accepted and mainstream, the kinds of challenges facing the stakeholders have also evolved, but not yet disappeared. Following an autoethnographic tradition, this paper draws on both semi-structured interview data and the author’s own decade of experience teaching computer science in Sino-foreign universities in China. It presents some reflections on what are perceived as continuing challenges for computer science education in these institutions.