CLI: Chinese Immersion Program in Guilin, China

My family and I - two adults, one 14 year old - studied at CLI Guilin for two weeks in July 2021. We had individual classes four hours a day, five days a week.

The teachers were fantastic. We appreciated the three teacher system, where you did not spend the entire day with any one teacher.

We stayed at CLI over the second week. Rooms was clean, simple, economical. We'd stay there again.

Our 14 year old wasn't happy with us for 'making' her do two weeks of Chinese classes during her summer break, but even she came around. Her teacher took her on walks where they played games, and she beat most comers at Mahjong.

Most importantly, we all felt more confident with our Chinese language skills after two weeks. We'd definitely consider going back next year.

CLI is fantastic and highly recommended! We loved our 2 week immersion program and only wish we could have stayed longer. Living in Beijing for nearly 2 years, my husband and I have taken Chinese lessons here and there, but our busy work schedules prevent us from spending enough time on it and really focusing. Our teen takes Chinese at school but finds it more academic, less conversational, and didn't feel confident speaking or navigating daily interactions. In China for the summer, we wanted to find a cool language program that would work for us as a family, all at different levels and with different learning styles. At CLI we each had our own 1-on-1 intensive classes during the day (the system of 3 teachers to 1 student is great) but met up in the kitchen at lunchtime for delicious communal meals with other students, and went out exploring Guilin or signed up for CLI activities in the afternoons. The husband liked the hikes, the teen loved the Mahjong lessons and volleyball excursion, and I was a fan of the CLI game room with ping pong table and well-stocked board game collection. The extensive library was great too. All of our teachers were excellent, patient and kind, the CLI team was super flexible with class scheduling, and you could choose the intensity of homework - relatively low in our case, to be honest, it was summer vacation after all! In general we could not have asked for a better experience (even the teen admitted she liked it, which is saying a lot). We stayed at a hotel in town for the first week, went on a weekend trip to a resort south of Guilin over the weekend, and then moved to the CLI dorm for the second week of class, which was comfortable and had everything we needed. We want to come back next summer!

CLI is a warm and welcoming learning community where you will immediately feel comfortable, no matter your level of Chinese learning. The teachers are very kind and dedicated, willing to adjust your lessons to whatever content and style you prefer. I am a foreigner living long-term in China, and came for 2 weeks to give my language learning a boost. I had many colleagues recommend CLI to me and I have to say that it truly exceeded my expectations. Guilin is a beautiful place - it is a walking/biking friendly city with everything you need, great food and snacks, and parks everywhere. I found it easy to immerse myself in studying while still feeling relaxed and enjoying myself. CLI arranges plenty of activities and weekend trips and there are plenty of beautiful spots to explore in and around Guilin.

I first found out about CLI from a quick google search on "Immersion programs in China". CLI showed up high on the list, and some research verified that it was legit. After doing some comparison shopping into other programs, CLI remained the best-value, best-looking program for a short-term program. Another huge perk was its excellent location in Guiling, one of the prettiest cities in China (It's also a short train ride from Guangzhou and Hong Kong).

From beginning till end, it was an unforgettable experience. After an outstanding pre-departure experience, I arrived to the CLI center Saturday afternoon and was warmly greeted by an intern - one of the local Chinese university students hired to support the CLI program. She took me up to the recreational room and I was immediately thrust into one of the almost-constant games of Mahjong. An hour later, I was invited to dinner by another student, an Australian professor-turned-expat, whose colleague was throwing a fancy dinner for him. I couldn't believe my luck, as I had the chance to participate in a traditional Chinese formal-style event, complete with excessive delicious food and generous Maotai Baijiu toasting.

One of the huge perks of CLI is that its students come from literally all walks of life. Summers and semesters tend to have far more college-aged students, but my time at CLI had a large variety of ages, professions, and backgrounds. Some of my best friends here were law students on break, professors of music and engineering, other college students, and international people from everywhere. It's a great chance to not only improve your Chinese knowledge, but also your general knowledge of the world.

The actual city itself, of course, was incredibly beautiful. There are constantly activities scheduled and planned by CLI, and an intense guide-book constantly being updated with suggestions from current and former students. Guilin is a smaller city, by Chinese standards, which means it's cheaper and more authentic than the bigger ones like Beijing or Nanjing. You can get a bao for literally 1 yuan, or some famous Guilin Mifun for 5 yuan. The CLI campus is well-situated next to a busy city street, as well as walking distance to city center and a nearby Wanda mall.

In terms of Chinese education, it's absolutely excellent. You're assigned 3 teachers: Comprehensive, Reading/Writing, and Listening/Speaking. They are personally assigned to you, with flexibility in teacher-choice and schedule, and they coordinate amongst each other to ensure you get the best education possible. Classes run from 0820-1020, 1030-1230, 1400-1600, and 1600-1800. You can use any textbook you want, but they are very strong at teaching the HSK series as well as the Integrated Chinese series.

Overall, I cannot recommend this program enough. Come check out CLI as soon as you can!

The great thing about CLI's Chinese Immersion Program is that it is truly authentic. If you choose to listen, speak and communicate only in Chinese, the CLI community will respect your wishes. Not only will you get four hours of classes each day, staff and students who live at the CLI building will also be talking with you in Chinese. If you are an absolute beginner, no problem. Staff respect this and will communicate to you in English when necessary.
I found the support given to be fantastic. This happened from the very beginning when applying for the program, right through to post departure follow-up. When I arrived in Guilin, I discovered my phone was so out-dated that I needed to buy a new one. One of CLI's interns came with me and helped my buy an appropriate phone. Back at CLI, staff helped me with downloading and installing the necessary apps for communication like WeiXin (We Chat).
Since students, interns and some staff live in the same building, there is never any issues of not having support when you need it. This is one of the advantages of CLI, it is not only a school, but a living, breathing community.
Another advantage is that lessons can be molded to suit your own interests. If you like text-book learning, that is fine. There are plenty of options there. If you prefer another method of instruction, you have personal preferences, or would like to study a different way, that can also be arranged. I preferred conversation, and my lessons were based on this.

I needed to review previously studied material for spoken Chinese. I needed to overcome shyness to speak and build fluency. CLI listened and designed my 1-week course to do this successfully. I even used classwork to talk to a local coffee shop worker. A small conversation, but a huge victory. Before I only used Chinese in the classrooms to complete lesson. I had little confidence to speak to Chinese people in real life situations. Now I have the confidence. Thanks CLI. I hope to return. Also, very skilled teachers and very friendly staff. I felt welcomed.

I arrived at CLI in September and studied there for 3 months. The less English you use the better you will be. You should be ready to prepare for classes the night before as well as reviewing what you have already learned. If you do this you will be able to finish one book a month and progress at a steady pace. You will become friends with your teachers which will help when class is rough and you are mentally exhausted. You also need to find Chinese friends outside of the school so you can practice speaking. A majority of the students at CLI only speak English which will mess with your brain and hinder you ability to speak and think in Chinese.

CLI attracted me because of its flexibility (start whenever you want, for however long you want), but now that the program is over, I truly understand why every aspect of this program is optimal for learning Chinese. It all sounds too good to be true, I know, but trust me -- this is the right program.

First of all, the flexibility and scheduling IS fantastic: I recommend trying to go for at least 8 weeks if you're a beginner! You want to make sure you're giving yourself enough time to actually learn & absorb, as well as participate in the evening & weekend activities.

Second of all, the one-on-one tutoring is absolutely STELLAR. Completely irreplaceable. I'll never try to learn a language in a big traditional classroom setting again. It's hard, because you can't just hide in the back of the class if you forgot some vocabulary or don't understand the grammar -- but that's exactly why it's so effective. Can you imagine any method that would teach you Chinese better than speaking Chinese one-on-one for HOURS every day with your teachers? I sure can't!

One thing I didn't expect was how absolutely patient, kind-hearted, and generally amazing the teachers & staff all are. Every now and then a teacher-student pairing won't be ideal (in which case you can easily talk to the staff and work out a schedule with a different teacher) but a vast majority of the students absolutely adore every one of their teachers -- myself included! My experience would have been nothing without the wonderful teachers & staff at CLI.

Lastly, I just have some advice. When you pursue this program (because of course you should!), make sure to use your time wisely. Speak Chinese outside the classroom as much as possible. Speak with other students, with the interns, with other teachers, with shopkeepers, with locals -- speak all the time! This is the one mistake I see many students making -- defaulting back to English when they're not in the classroom.

Good luck! I promise you won't regret it if you choose to take this adventure. It will change your life to become a member of the CLI family! :)