Supporting Chinese Students Studying in the U.S.

In 1868 the Burlingame Treaty was signed between the United States and China. The treaty established formal friendly relations between the two countries, with the United States granting China “Most Favored Nations” status. Article VII of the treaty declared, "Chinese subjects shall enjoy all the privileges of the public educational institutions under the control of the government of the United States." Under the direction of what became known as the Chinese Educational Commission, headquartered in Hartford, Connecticut, a plan was developed to send Chinese students to the United States to study for fifteen years and then return to China in order to serve their homeland. The two Chinese citizens who headed the Commission, Chen Lan-Pin and Yung Wing (who had graduated from Yale in 1854, becoming the first Chinese citizen to graduate from an American university) constituted the first Chinese delegation to the United States. In 1913, Carnegie Corporation made a grant of $200,000 (equal to approximately $4 million in today’s dollars) to the Commission to support Chinese students studying at U.S. colleges and universities.