Students' pick of languages is starting to shift

More high schools in China are offering Russian courses as student interest in the language grows in secondary schools, particularly since the Belt and Road Initiative was proposed, educators said.

The Russian program at Jianwen Foreign Language School, a high school in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, attracted only 24 students when it was established in 2011. But interest has grown quickly, especially after the initiative was proposed in 2013, according to Li Guangming, the vice-principal.

"The program at our school has almost 250 students," he said. "About 80 graduates of the program were accepted by higher education institutions in Russia. ... Many others went to domestic universities."