Hopkins-Nanjing Center Blog

From January 15-19, 10 students from Nanjing and 10 students from Washington, DC embarked on the annual Asia Career Trek, a week-long trip to a variety of companies and firms in Shanghai and Hong Kong including: Wells Fargo, Deloitte, KPMG, Johnson & Johnson, HSBC, JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Control Risks, Goldman Sachs, and the Economist Intelligence Unit. Current students Teng Men and Kris Rodulfo share what they learned during their meetings on the trek. SAIS and HNC students visit Wells Fargo in Shanghai. During the week-long Asia Career Trek, we had the opportunity to visit a variety of companies and firms ranging from finance, risk management, and healthcare in Shanghai and Hong Kong including, Johnson & Johnson, HSBC, and Morgan Stanley. We were kindly received by many of the employees at these companies, most of whom were SAIS or HNC alumni. The alumni were at all different points in their career, and the stories they shared about their work was illustrative and h...

Ellis Gyöngyös, Certificate ’14, is the founder and CEO of Know Your Token, an ICO and cryptocurrency due diligence provider and advisory firm. Let’s start by having you talk a bit about yourself. I went to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and majored in Chinese and International Economics and immediately went to the HNC after graduating. After completing a certificate at the center, I attended a career trek arranged by Robbie Shields, HNC’s Career Advisor. Afterwards, I applied to several positions and got my first job in Hong Kong at Kroll. I worked as an analyst there for over 3 years conducting compliance and regulatory due diligence with a focus on IPO projects. My position called for a lot of Chinese research, a skill I strengthened at the HNC. Recently, I left Kroll to start my own company providing due diligence on ICOs (Initial Coin Offerings) and I’ll be doing deep dive due diligence on crypto companies. This is a hot new field and I’m really excited! ...

Before I arrived at the Hopkins Nanjing Center, I didn’t really know what my life would look like in Nanjing outside of the graduate level classes taught in Chinese . I knew that I would live on campus with a Chinese roommate  presumably eat a mix of food from the onsite cafeteria and outside restaurants, and likely spend a bit of time exploring the city and beyond. There were things that I never expected to join in with, and chief among them was dancing to catchy Latin songs at the Nanjing University track alongside retirees, students and young kids. A typical scene mid-dance Allow me to explain. Via a WeChat group (because how else would anything be coordinated in China, ever) a handful of Zumba enthusiasts alerted an audience of 200 or so Nanjing-based WeChat users to when and where a gathering of Zumba dancing would take place: usually Wednesday and Sunday afternoons at the Nanjing University track (which is a convenient 5 minute walk from the Hopkins Nanjing Center). O...

Photos by Emily Rivera, Certificate '18

Sean Linkletter is a senior analyst at JLL, an American commercial real estate firm, in Shanghai. He graduated with a Certificate from the Hopkins-Nanjing Center in 2015.   Let’s start by having you talk a bit about yourself.  I spent my youth in Santa Cruz, California and then studied finance and Chinese at the University of South Carolina. I had always had a fascination with the Chinese language and culture, as I grew up in California near large Chinese communities. I decided to study Chinese to satisfy the language requirement in college and did a program at Tsinghua University in Beijing my junior year. After graduating, I wanted to work in finance and real estate in the US – ideally for a REIT (real estate investment trust) but my work experience and limited industry connections did not put me in a strong position after school. Additionally, Chinese investment in the US real estate market was quite limited at the time, so it would have been hard to utilize my languag...

Student blogger Emily Rivera shares the HNC experience of her Chinese roommate:肖玲. 肖玲 describes her reasons for choosing the HNC, her thoughts on how HNC student groups and courses compare to Chinese universities, and her memories of her very first day at the HNC. A very unique aspect of the Hopkins-Nanjing Center is the majority of international students and Chinese students get paired to live together as roommates. When I was completing a Chinese language intensive program in Beijing, I lived with an international student in an international student dorm, which is the norm for many study abroad programs in China. The focus of the HNC, however, is not only the improvement of your language skills while taking graduate level courses – the HNC places a large focus on cultural exchange as well. The HNC’s intercultural community, which stood apart to me from other graduate programs, is one of the reasons I chose to apply. At the HNC the goal is to pair students with roommates who ...

Student blogger, Alexandra Hansen, features 10 ways that HNC students like to spend their weekends. We hope that through this post you will be able to better understand the HNC’s tight-knit community and culture. 大家好！ Happy Holidays! It’s been a busy time of year at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center. January has brought with it many assignments, presentations, and guest lectures. Nonetheless, HNC students are still finding ways to relax and have fun. With this in mind, here are the Top 10 things HNC students do on the weekends in order to rest and unwind. Number 1: Explore Xuanwu Lake, the surrounding Nanjing wall and Jiming Temple This is only a 15-minute walk off-campus! Number 2: Volunteer at a local elementary school  Some students choose to volunteer every Friday evening and teach English at a local school.  Number 3: Hang out with your roommate HNC roommate pairs are a great way for students to deepen their cultural exchange experience.  Numb...