The 24th Annual International Conference of Chinese American Educational Research and Development Association (CAERDA) was held on 7 and 8 April in Washington DC, USA. UIC’s Applied Psychology student, Serene Ningxuan Hua, won the Student Paper Award under the Award Committee’s strict review.

Applied Psychology student Serene Ningxuan Hua (r) wins the Student Paper Award
A total of four UIC students presented their research at this annual conference whose theme was “Applying Evidenced-based Research to Best Practices in PreK-20”. One was from the Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL) Programme, Lisa Xinshuang Wang, and the others were from the Applied Psychology (APSY) Programme: Phoebe Miao Zhang, Iris Jiayun Zhang and Serene Ningxuan Hua.
Their presentations impressed the conference participants by their rigorous research designs and confident dispositions. The former president of the Association also praised them for their effective presentation skills, solid academic foundation and down-to-earth research attitude.

The APSY and TESL students and teachers who attend the conference
Also invited to attend this conference were UIC’s Prof Mildred Yang (Director of General Education Office), Dr Yi-Lung Kuo (Assistant Professor of APSY), Dr Kai Pan Mark (Associate Director of the ITSC), Ms Chunyan Ji (Senior Lecturer of CST), Dr Mark Perry (Assistant Professor of GEO), Dr Edith Yan (Programme Director of TESL) and Ms Lily Liu (Teaching Assistant of TESL).

Special thanks to Vice President Prof Cong Zhang, Dr Edith Yan, Dr Ghee Ho, Dr Richard Burchett, Dr Yi-Lung Kuo and Dr Alan Lai for offering advice in the rehearsal at UIC so these four students could tailor the presentations according to the conference situation before heading for Washington.
As the Vice President and Co-Chair of 2016 CAERDA Annual International Conference, Dr Yi-Lung Kuo has been nominated as the President of CAERDA in the years 2016-2018. Dr Kuo mentions that the 2017 Annual International Conference is scheduled to be held between 26 and 27 April in San Antonio, Texas, USA. He hopes that in the near future, more and more UIC staff and students can join CAERDA international conference as it offers the platform to exchange views and update information about international educational studies, in particular within Chinese research contexts.

Dr Yi-Lung Kuo (r) is awarded by the former president of CAERDA
(from APSY and TESL, with special thanks to the ELC)