Der-lin Chao

PI and Project Director

Dr. Chao is Professor and Head of Chinese Program at Hunter College since 1998. She holds a Ph.D. in Applied Linguistics from New York University. In addition to teaching and research, Dr. Chao has extensive experience in managing federally funded projects. She received a U.S. Department of Education Instructional Research Studies grant to develop multimedia Chinese literacy instructional materials in 2001. Dr. Chao has directed STARTALK summer student and teacher programs since 2007. In 2017 she received STARTALK infrastructure grants to develop curricula and materials to promote blended learning, and in 2018, grants to develop a Guide on how to ensure K16 curricular articulation. Dr. Chao has been the Director of the Chinese Flagship program since 2011 and received Flagship funding to implement projects including the teacher training workshops for Flagship and Project Go teachers (2014), the Flagship K-12 blended learning pilot project (2015 to 2017), and the Global Linkage project (2018 to 2020).

Ming-Ying Li

Assistant Project Director

Dr. Li holds a Ph.D. degree in Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis in Language, Culture and Society from Pennsylvania State University. Before coming to Hunter College, she taught Chinese language courses at Pennsylvania State University and University of Colorado Boulder. At Hunter College since 2017, she co-designed and taught an innovative course Chinese for the Global Workforce funded by City University of New York (CUNY) to combine advanced-level language studies with internship opportunities. In addition to teaching, she serves as the outreach coordinator for the Hunter Chinese Flagship program. With a strong research background, Dr. Li is key in supervising undergraduate Flagship students’ honors theses and graduate-level research projects for M.A. students. Her primary research area is teaching and learning Chinese as a heritage language with a focus on literacy development. She collaborated with the National Language Resource Center at CUNY to study writing proficiency outcomes and characteristics of college-level Chinese heritage learners.

Bing Ying Hu

Academic Liaison

Ms. Hu has an M.A. in the Teaching of Chinese degree from Hunter College. She also holds a Grades 7-12 New York State Chinese Teacher Certification. Ms. Hu is a tenured lecturer at Hunter College and has been the curriculum coordinator for the Hunter Chinese Flagship since 2011. In addition to teaching undergraduate courses, she is the instructor for the teaching practicum course in the M.A. in the Teaching of Chinese program and serves as a field supervisor. Ms. Hu is active in the development and research in K-16 teaching and learning. She was the Assistant Director of the Flagship K-12 Blended Learning Pilot Project (2015-2017) and holds assistant directorship for the Global Linkage Project (2017-2018). In these projects, she focuses on using proficiency-based curriculum and the blended learning (combining face-to-face and online teaching) approach. In addition, she led the professional development workshops to provide one-on-one online instruction to Grades K-16 students.

Bo Hao

Assessment Liaison

Mr. Bo Hao has an M.A. in the Teaching of Chinese from Hunter College and holds a Grades 7-12 New York State Chinese Teacher Certification. He is a tenured lecturer at Hunter College. A certified OPI tester, Bo has served as the assessment coordinator for Hunter Chinese Flagship program since 2011. In addition, he is an adviser for the M.A. Teacher Education program. Bo is an expert in proficiency-based instruction to push students from intermediate level to advanced and superior levels. He conducted numerous professional development workshops at Hunter and other institutions. He frequently delivers presentations on this topic at national conferences. In addition to the undergraduate program, Bo teaches courses in the M.A. program and serves as a field supervisor for teaching practicum. Bo was the lead teacher for Hunter College's STARTALK student programs for three years and is currently the lead teacher for the teacher program.

Audrey Moore

Project Coordinator

Audrey Moore is the Project Coordinator for the Chinese Flagship Overseas Capstone Program in Taiwan. She is a Flagship alumna, having graduated from the Flagship program in the spring of 2021, and has also become Flagship certified. She has participated in and completed study abroad programs in both Taiwan (ICLP) and Beijing (PIB), and was awarded the Benjamin A. Gilman scholarship, the Panda Cares scholarship, and the Huayu Enrichment scholarship. She graduated from Queensborough Community College with an A.A in Liberal Arts for the Humanities and graduated from Hunter College with a B.A in Chinese language and History, along with a minor in Japanese language.

Janet Tan

Project Assistant

Janet Tan is the Project Assistant for the Chinese Flagship Overseas Capstone Program at Hunter College. Her recent completion of Capstone in Taiwan in late 2022 marked her graduation from the Chinese Flagship Program at Hunter College, where she achieved Flagship certification with distinction. Throughout her academic journey at Hunter College, Janet distinguished herself as a Jenny Hunter Scholar and received the prestigious Benjamin A. Gilman Scholarship. Her academic journey has equipped her with a strong foundation, as she now holds a B.A. in Chinese Language and Literature and Economics with a minor in Mathematics.

Ching-Ping Tang

Project Director at NCCU

Ching-Ping Tang, a Ph.D. from USC, is now a Distinguished Professor of Political Science, Vice President for International Cooperation, and Director of the University Outreach Office at National ChengChi University (in Taiwan). As a public intellectual, he has long trained public officers at different levels of government, served in ad hoc governmental committees for independent decisions, and offered consultation opinions for non-governmental or civil organizations. As a scholar, he transgressed disciplinary boundaries to get innovative ideas for theory building and published works in rigorous journals of different fields, including sociological/anthropological, environmental, developmental, and political Journals. In recent years, he adventured in the engaged scholarship in which he trained students and local entrepreneurs to promote just development in the neighboring communities of the campus. This led to his engagement in innovations and experiments in liberal arts education.

Sherry Lee

Site Director

Sherry Lee is a dedicated education professional who earned her Master's degree in TESOL from Arkansas Tech University. From 2002 to 2009, she taught K-6th grade ESL programs at bilingual and local schools before moving to an international school as a Student Life Officer. She played an integral role in the development of the school system since its first year, and her expertise and experience were crucial to the success of numerous academic and non-academic events such as camps, design thinking workshops, MUN conferences, musical productions, and more. Sherry's commitment to education and her ability to foster positive relationships with students, teachers, and staff make her an asset to the institution.

Yu-Ting Hung

Student Affairs Coordinator

Yu-Ting Hung graduated from the Foreign Language Teaching Department of Providence University with a minor in Chinese language teaching. She has years of experience in school administration and activities. Her main responsibilities are taking care of student accommodation issues and local cultural learning activities such as homestays and language learning partners.

April (Tzu-Ling) Liu

Internship Coordinator

Liu Laoshi has an M.A. in Drama and Theatre Education from the University of Warwick, and she received her B.A. in Teaching Chinese as a Second Language from Chuong Yuan University. She holds a 2009 Certification of Proficiency in Teaching Chinese as a Second Language, and also in 2007 obtained Certification of Putonghua Proficiency. After Liu Laoshi completed her graduate degree, she undertook editing the achievement test for students at National Taiwan Normal University in the Mandarin Training Center, and then worked for six years at the Ministry of Education. At the Ministry, she was responsible for the support, administration, and organization of a wide variety of tasks for the overseas Mandarin education department, such as helping schools looking for cooperation opportunities, formulating a cooperation contract between schools, and implementing key performance metrics at work, and more. From her professional experiences, Liu Laoshi is now equipped with a strong teaching background and insight into the policies behind the Taiwanese educational system. She is familiar with labor regulations and the job market in Taiwan. Combining her background knowledge with her teaching and work experience, she will be an effective Resident Coordinator, capable of helping Capstone students with any issues that might arise.

Charlotte Parker

Student Life Coordinator

Charlotte Parker (潘筱蕾) has a B.A. in sociology and anthropology from the University of Puget Sound. While completing her degree, Charlotte also spent 6 months studying Chinese intensively in Taiwan and Shanghai. After graduating, Charlotte completed an English teaching fellowship with Fulbright Taiwan during which she acted as a cultural representative for the U.S. government in fostering closer ties between the U.S. and Taiwan. After her work in Taiwan, Charlotte returned to the U.S. to serve as an intern with the Taiwan External Trade Development Council where she was responsible for translating documents and coordinating American business owners' travel to Taiwan trade shows. She has also served as a Family Service Coordinator for an Early Education Center in Seattle, assisting young families facing multiple barriers to find housing, employment, and child care. Charlotte is passionate about international education, human rights, and helping others meet their needs to achieve their highest potential.

Fuxiong Yang

General Affairs Coordinator

Yang Fuxiong, a graduate of WuFeng University's Department of Fire Science, previously held an executive role in general affairs at POU CHEN GROUP's Vietnam branch from 2016 to 2023. In this capacity, his responsibilities included the establishment and maintenance of the park surveillance system, security management, maintenance of fire systems and supervision of the fire brigade, management of foreign executive dormitories and daily living arrangements, oversight of the central kitchen for employees, management of outsourced services, maintenance of park greenery, operation of medical stations, and management of company and outsourced vehicle fleets, as well as procurement and contract acceptance for general affairs projects. He is currently employed at the U.S. Language Flagship Overseas Center in Taiwan, where he is responsible for students' on- and off-campus dormitories and general affairs.

Si-Ping Wang

Media and editorial staff

Si-Ping Wang holds a degree from the Department of Radio & Television at National Chengchi University (NCCU). Her professional journey includes several years of experience in film editing, which she gained during her tenure at an e-commerce company. There, she developed expertise in filming, editing, and photography. Currently, Si-Ping is responsible for various aspects of her role, which include filmmaking, design-related tasks, and assisting with student affairs. While actively contributing to student activities, she dedicates herself to the meticulous editing of pictures and videos to create meaningful records for students' benefit.

Jui-Ting Lee

Academic Coordinator & Full-time Faculty

Jui-Ting Lee received her B.A. in Teaching Chinese as a Second Language from National Taiwan Normal University and her M.A. in East Asian Languages and Cultures from Florida State University, her master's thesis focusing on how to increase Chinese language learners’ awareness when typing Chinese homophones on devices. Jui-Ting was a Chinese teaching assistant at the Chinese Flagship Program at the University of North Georgia (2019-2020), taught at Florida State University (2020-2022), and also taught at the intensive Chinese language program, Princeton in Beijing (2022).

Shu-Wan Chang

Full-time Faculty

Ms. Chang holds an M.A. from the School of Chinese as a Second Language at Peking University (2015). She has participated in several summer programs from the Overseas Community Affairs Council (2012 and 2019), worked as an elementary Mandarin/Homeroom/American Social Science teacher at Wesley International School in Thailand (2019-2021), taught cadets from the United States Military Academy (West Point) at National Chengchi University (2021-2022), and taught at the American Institute in Taiwan (2022-2023). She is confident that her experience working at the American Institute in Taiwan will be of great benefit to the students in the Language Flagship Program.

Yi Chen

Full-time Faculty

Yi (Norris) Chen has an M.A. in Teaching Chinese as a Second Language from National Cheng-chi University in Taipei, Taiwan. As a Foreign Language Teaching Assistant of Fulbright, he went to Western Kentucky University in the United States to teach Chinese during the academic year of 2016-17. He also headed for Thailand to teach Chinese heritage students at Jian-Hua Comprehensive High School (2018-19). His teaching experience is not confined to Chinese as a Foreign Language (CFL), as he has taught Chinese at Feng Chia University in Taichung, Taiwan (2017-18, 2019-21). Before joining the Chinese Flagship Overseas Capstone Program in Taiwan, he taught non-heritage and heritage Chinese courses as visiting lecturer at the Chinese Language Program in the Department of Asian Studies at the University of British Columbia in Canada (2021-23).

Sun-Li Chi

Full-time Faculty

Chi Laoshi (Mr. Sun-Li Chi) has an M.A. in teaching Chinese as a Second Language from National Taiwan Normal University. His thesis focused on persuasive strategies in Chinese academic writing. He has taught in the Critical Language Scholarship and Taiwan Intensive Summer Language Program at National Cheng Kung University (2017-2018), the regular Chinese language program at Tamkang University (2018), and the regular and intensive program at the Mandarin Training Center at National Taiwan Normal University (2018-2021). Chi Laoshi received a Certificate of Qualification to teach Mandarin from the Taiwan Ministry of Education in 2016. He has experience in teaching teenagers, adults and online classes.

Yu-Chia Hsu

Full-time Faculty

Yu-Chia Hsu has an M.A. in Teaching Chinese as a Second Language from National Taiwan University. Her master's thesis focuses on the analysis and instructional design of confusable Chinese action verbs. She holds a Bachelor's Degree in Chinese Literature and Teaching Education from National Central University. With this background, she is able to connect classic literature with modern social issues to elicit students' learning interests and incorporate several reading strategies into teaching to help students understand Chinese grammar in context. Yu-Chia taught at Heidelberg University (Germany), an Academic & Business Chinese class at Harvard University (USA), and a master's writing class at Palacký University (Czech Republic). These teaching experiences allow her to understand more about the difficulties of foreign learners acquiring Chinese as a language. She has explored many multimedia techniques to design teaching materials and applied corpus python to program a question database to improve learning efficiency.

Yu-Ting Jian

Full-time Faculty

Ms. Jian holds an M.A. in Teaching Chinese as a Second Language from Chung Yuan Christian University, as well as a Certificate of Proficiency for Teaching Chinese as a Second/Foreign Language issued by the Ministry of Education in Taiwan. She also holds a teaching certificate in junior high and senior secondary schools. Her master's thesis focused on teaching Chinese for content and language-integrated learning. She has worked as a tutor for the Chinese Flagship Program at Indiana University (2021-2022) and as a drill instructor and skills trainer at the Hamilton Lugar School's 2022 Summer Language Workshop. Additionally, she has taught at Tamkang University's OCAC Language Study Program (2021), Chung Yuan Christian University's Chinese Language and Culture Experience Program (2021), and served as a language tutor at Dan Kook University (2019–2020).

Shaowei Liao

Full-time Faculty

Mr. Liao has an M.A. in Teaching Chinese as a Second Language from National Taiwan Normal University, and a Certification of Proficiency in teaching Chinese as a second language. His master’s thesis focused on teaching Chinese for specific purposes and corpus analysis. He has taught at National Taiwan Normal University OCAC Language Study Program (2021), and Shih Chien University OCAC Language Study Program (2018). Prior to that, Mr. Liao studied at the Department of Chinese Literature and did teaching internships at National Cheng Kung University (2017). While obtaining his B.A., Mr. Liao taught in the Taiwan-United States Sister Relations Alliance program (2016), and at the Nanzan University Chinese Language and Culture Immersion Program (2016) as a one-on-one tutor.

Chien-Yu Lin

Full-time Faculty

Chien-Yu Lin received her M.A. in Teaching Chinese as a Second Language from National Chengchi University in Taipei, Taiwan, with a research focus on psycholinguistics, particularly in the processing of Chinese nominal metaphors. She also holds the Certificate of Qualification to teach Mandarin Chinese as a foreign language.

Chien-Yu served as a Chinese teaching assistant at the Chinese Flagship Program at Western Kentucky University (2022-2023) and at Asbury University for the KACLT Chinese STARTALK Camp (2023).

Additionally, she taught online classes for masters and undergraduate students at Masaryk University (2022) and at Brown University (2021) and worked as an assessment teacher at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) (2021). She has also taught at Tamkang University OCAC Language Study Program (2021) and Chung Yuan Christian OCAC Language Study Program (2021) for compatriot youth.

Shiang-Han Lin

Full-time Faculty

Shiang-Han Lin has an M.A. in teaching Chinese as a Second Language from National Taiwan Normal University. She has taught at the Witten-Herdecke University in Germany (2016-2017), the regular Chinese language program at Shih-Chien University (2017-2020), and at the intensive Chinese language program Princeton in Beijing (2018/2019). She was also a visiting lecturer at the University of British Columbia in Canada (2021-2022).

Yen-Yu Lin

Full-time Faculty

Ms. Lin graduated with an M.A. degree in Teaching World Languages from the University of Kentucky. She has taught at the University of Kentucky (2019-2021), Wesleyan University (2021-2023), Princeton in Beijing Summer Intensive Language Program (2021), the Taiwan Intensive Summer Language Program at National Cheng Kung University (2022-2023), and for the Critical Language Scholarship. Ms. Lin has held the Certificate of Qualification to teach Mandarin Chinese from the Taiwan Ministry of Education since 2018. She has experience working with non-heritage speakers as well as heritage speakers and teenagers.

Jo Han Tseng

Full-time Faculty

Jo-Han Tseng has an M.A. in Teaching Chinese as a Second Language from Chung Yuan Christian University. Her master's thesis focuses on digitalized Chinese characters' typing and digital teaching methodology.

She was a Chinese teaching assistant at the Chinese Flagship Program at Indiana University (2022-2023), a drill instructor and skills trainer at Hamilton Lugar School's 2023 Summer Language Workshop, a regular Chinese language program teacher and an online program teacher at Chung Yuan Christian University (2019-2023). Besides teaching adults, she also has experience teaching teenagers and children, having taught at Chung Yuan Christian University's OCAC Language Study Program and American Chiao Hsin Chinese Language School.

I Chuan Wei

Full-time Faculty

I Chuan Wei is a master’s degree student in the teaching Chinese as a second/foreign language department at National Taipei University of Education. Her master’s thesis is about how to improve Chinese language learners’ colloquial expressions during discourse. She also possesses a certificate from the Ministry of Education in teaching Chinese to non-native speakers. She has participated in several intensive summer programs such as Mississippi University’s flagship program (2021), National Cheng Kung University’s CLS & TISLP programs (2019), and National Taiwan University’s ICLP summer flagship program (2018). Aside from teaching adults she also has experience teaching teenagers and children, having taught a Chinese language summer camp for teenagers, a European-American cultural research group, and a class of transnational children.

Yea-Fen Chen

Indiana University

Professor Yea-Fen Chen is the director of the Indiana University Chinese Flagship Center and former Executive Director of the Chinese Language Teachers Association (US). She has been teaching Mandarin Chinese since 1989. She holds a Ph.D. in Foreign Language Education and an M.A. in Applied Linguistics from Indiana University Bloomington, and co-authored four Chinese language textbooks including Integrated Chinese Level 1 and Chaoyue: Advancing in Chinese: A Textbook for Intermediate to Preadvanced Students. She has been an AP Chinese Language and Culture Course and Exam consultant for the College Board since 2006. She was the coordinator of the Chinese Program and the Asian Studies Certificate Program at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee before joining Indiana University in 2013.

Charles Egan

San Francisco State University

Charles Egan (B.A., Yale; Ph.D., Princeton) is professor of Chinese and chair of the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at San Francisco State University. He has also served as director of the SF State Chinese Flagship Program since its founding in 2009. He has published extensively on the evolution of Chinese classical poetic genres and is a frequent translator. His book, Clouds Thick, Whereabouts Unknown: Poems by Zen Monks of China (Columbia University Press), was awarded the 2011 Lucien Stryk Prize in Asian Translation by the American Literary Translators Association. Currently he is preparing a new anthology of inscriptions and poetry from or about the Angel Island Immigration Station in San Francisco Bay.

Zhuo Jing-Schmidt

University of Oregon

Zhuo Jing-Schmidt is Professor of Chinese Linguistics in the Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures at the University of Oregon where she also serves as the director of the Chinese Flagship Program. Dr. Jing-Schmidt researches and teaches at the interface of language structure, discourse pragmatics, emotion, language and gender, and Chinese second language learning. She publishes in three languages – English, Chinese, and German, and has placed her work in leading international journals including Cognitive Linguistics, Journal of Pragmatics, Language in Society, and the Modern Language Journal. She is Executive Editor of Chinese Language and Discourse.

Jianling Liao

Arizona State University

Jianling Liao is the Director of the Chinese Language Flagship Program at Arizona State University (ASU). She received her PhD in Second Language Acquisition from the University of Iowa. Her publications focus on L2 Chinese development manifested in both written and spoken modalities, as well as the mediation roles of digital tools in L2 learning. She has also published a book on Chinese language curriculum design and another book on language testing and assessment. At ASU, she teaches second language methodologies, applied linguistics, and Chinese language courses at various levels. Previously she had worked for the CIEE Shanghai Study Center and therefore understands firsthand the opportunities and challenges that study abroad presents to students.