Two schools will open branches in Dubai with a combined enrolment capacity of up to 4,000 students. [...] The Centre of Excellence for Arabic Language, Culture and the Arts located on the same campus, will be dedicated to the development of intra-cultural exchange, facilitate both teacher and student development, as well as promote a deeper understanding of the rich Arabic history and traditions.

Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed often says that cities are where the global economy is most readily influenced and where its impacts are most easily felt. The mayor, who visited the Paris climate talks last year for a city leaders forum, has an ideological ally in the newly arrived French consul general in Atlanta, Louis de Corail.

The Chinese leader hailed the progress in bilateral cultural exchange that he said shortens the distance between the peoples who share similar experiences of suffering foreign aggression and social turmoil. The president said he believed the progressive cultural exchange between China and Latin America will also play a role in the development of the world civilization.

“The cultural exchange is so important for finding commonalities and learning about differences, traditions and every day life, and you really become more immersed in the cultural than you would by just reading about it,” West said. “We have members from Iowa, Minnesota — people really want to support the connection to Ireland.”

UK students will be able to enjoy a meal while listening to some of UKCI’s Chinese cultural programming, as well as network with other fellow students who are also interested in Chinese life and culture. The reception will feature different activities for all the guests including Chinese games, Chinese costumes, a guzheng and dulcimer performance, and a catered Chinese dinner.

Next month New York’s David Geffen Hall will welcome a visiting orchestra, on a tour including other top venues in Los Angeles and San Francisco. But the guest orchestra is not the Berlin Philharmonic or one of Europe’s other esteemed ensembles. It is the China Philharmonic Orchestra (CPO), which was founded in Beijing a mere 16 years ago.

For Monasterio and others, the visit merges soft diplomacy through cultural and student exchanges with state diplomacy. "It's in the people-to-people world ... where Canadian-Cuban relationships are the most significant," said Karen Dubinsky, who teaches in a joint Queen's University-University of Havana course that brings Cuban students to Canada and sends Canadian students to Cuba.

The number of international students at U.S. colleges and universities topped 1 million for the first time, paced by a surge of graduate students in sciences, engineering and math from India. China still sends the most students — 328,500 or nearly a third — but enrollments from India climbed 25 percent to almost 166,000 in 2015–2016.