Leaders in Kentucky education, government, and business met with their counterparts in several major cities in the People’s Republic of China during a week long leadership mission from June 24 through July 2. The mission, which was organized through a partnership between the University of Kentucky Asia Center and the Kentucky World Trade Center (KyWTC), established opportunities for cooperative exchanges between China and Kentucky and gave each side an opportunity for greater insight into each other’s educational, economic, and political culture.

Recognizing the Commonwealth’s developing connections with the People’s Republic of China, and the mutual benefits that those relationships could engender, the UK Asia Center partnered with the Kentucky World Trade Center to organize the Kentucky – China Leadership Mission. This mission involved a trip to China and the coordination of a series of meetings with key policy leaders on both sides of the Atlantic.

China’s emergence as a global power in trade and industry has already prompted many Kentucky corporations to forge partnerships with that country’s business leaders. In fact, the group of twenty-six Kentucky representatives were among the first to visit the new Kentucky Trade Mission Office in the capital city of Beijing.

Former Governor Martha Layne Collins, Chair and CEO of the KyWTC served as Mission Leader of the Kentucky - China Conference. Beth Goldstein, a professor in the UK College of Education and co-director of the Asia Center; and Ying Juan Rogers, Trade Services Manager with the KyWTC, served as mission co-directors and coordinated events in the four major cities they visited: Shanghai, the capital of Jiangxi Province (Kentucky’s sister province), Nanchang, Jiujiang (Louisville’s sister city in China), and Beijing. The Freeman Foundation, a philanthropic organization dedicated to the promotion of greater understanding between the United States and the nations of East Asia, provided partial support for the leadership mission.

“The goals of our respective organizations are to promote a better understanding of the overlapping relationships that exist among education, government, and business. This mission gave our policy leaders an opportunity to engage in an exchange of cultural information and, further, to underscore the need to internationalize our approaches to education in support of global relations and commerce,” commented Dr. Goldstein. “When this journey concludes, policymakers on both continents will have better insights into what each side must do to strengthen our relationships and develop partnerships based on a mutual understanding.”

Other mission participants included William Eblen, Managing Editor of the Lexington Herald-Leader; Daryl Love, Community Relations Manager of Ashland Inc.; Rodney Bohannon, President of the Briggs and Stratton Corporation; Anthony Newberry, President of the Jefferson Community and Technical College System; Kentucky Representatives David Osborne and Reginald Meeks; and Kentucky Senator Gerald Neal.