CHICAGO, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Twenty-two Chinese students studying in Chicago received an annual Chinese government award Friday.
The Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Self-Financed Students Abroad was a scholarship set up by China Scholarship Council to honor students with outstanding academic accomplishment, Chinese Consul General to Chicago Yang Guoqiang said at a ceremony here.
The scholarship was awarded this year to 497 Chinese students studying in 29 countries, including 130 in the United States.
"Overseas students are an important force in promoting China's economic and social development as well as realizing the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation," Yang said.
Eighty-one percent of the academics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, 54 percent of the academics of Chinese Academy of Engineering and many of the university heads in China had overseas studying experience, he told the students, families and scholars.
Cen Yuhao and Tang Gongguo, both winners of the award, said they would use the 5,000-dollar scholarship to finance their research.
The scholarship honors outstanding self-financed students who are less than 40 years old, holding Chinese passports and attending doctoral programs lasting more than a year.
