Living the English dream

If, Yu Minhong, the 44–year–old son of a peasant and carpenter is one of China's richest men today, it is due to his mastery of English.

Yu Minhong says he can never forget watching his father collect bits of waste brick and stones and stack them up in the small courtyard of their rural home a long time ago.

What use was all this rubble and debris, he used to wonder. The answer came when his father one day transformed the stones into a small pen to shut in the pigs, hen and ducks. At that time, his family could not afford to buy bricks.

Yu says his father's determination and foresight have influenced his whole life. "If you have a map in your head, you can always turn stones into a building."

Yu Minhong, or Michael Yu, did just that, epitomizing the rags–to–riches trajectories of those who have been able to grasp the opportunities in a rapidly changing China.

Yu piled up days and days of hard work to eventually secure admission to the university after two failures. He carefully collected English words to one day become a university English teacher. And he started his own English training school.

Yu's school, which has surfed on the obsession for studying English, has helped hundreds of thousands of Chinese students get into US universities.

The company, New Oriental Education and Technology Group, was listed on the New York Stock Exchange in September, the first private education company to achieve this feat. Yu is thought to be China's richest teacher with about 2 billion yuan ($ 250 million) of assets.

"I'm not excited at the news. It's not a miracle but a natural result of our efforts over the past 13 years. It's just a milestone along the way. There is still a long way to go. We have to walk straighter, for many more people are watching us now," Yu says.

The bespectacled and smiling man enjoys encouraging students with Martin L. King's line from his speech "I Have a Dream." He made it a credo for the New Oriental schools.

Founded in 1993, New Oriental has grown from a class of only 30 students to China's largest private education service provider with more than three million student enrollments.

It has a network of 25 schools and 111 learning centers in 24 cities as well as an on–line network that has attracted two million registered users.

Clearly, teaching English can make people rich in China.

Like many of his peers, Yu wanted to pursue an American dream in the late 1980s, but failed repeatedly to obtain a visa.

Stymied in his ambitions, he started to cash in on helping others fulfill their American dreams. He quit a stable job as an English teacher at Beijing University and started up a business to help students develop their English skills.

Yu's company no longer teaches only English. His business has extended to other foreign language training, preparing students for tests, primary and secondary school education and software as well as on–line education.

"Instilling a certain spirit in students is as important as giving them a skill," Yu says.

Yu is trying to inspire students by inviting high achievers–including moguls from real estate, the dairy industry or advertising–to talk about their individual road to success.

"We are committed to training a new generation of business and community leaders, empowering students to achieve their potential, build self–confidence, and develop a global vision encompassing both traditional Chinese values and modern thinking," Yu says.

While he encourages students to try various paths to success, Yu would never call himself successful.

"A career must always develop and so must a man. You can never call a living man a success, it is only when he goes to his eternal rest that a judgment can be made," Yu says.

"My next aim is to build New Oriental into a model for China's private education," says Yu, who sports a crew cut and casual wear in his office in northwestern downtown Beijing.

Yu attributes his school's success to its quality teachers and unique enterprise culture.

"We recruit talented teachers and grow them in various ways including funding them to study abroad.

"Besides academic qualifications, all teachers must be passionate, inspiring and humorous when they interact with students." (Xinhua)