The Overseas Chinese Academy of Chiway Suzhou in SIP has spent a decade fostering a Chinese-style international education framework, aiming to help its students lay a solid foundation for future development.

Inaugurated on the Jinji Lake shore in 2016, the school is the first of its kind in China, purpose-built for the children of overseas returnees and overseas Chinese, as well as for any students seeking a Chinese-style international education.

The school offers a 16-year continuum of Chinese-English bilingual education from nursery through high school, covering an International Baccalaureate (IB) curriculum consisting of PYP, MYP and DP programs. It is also the first school in Suzhou authorized to offer both IB and A-Level (Cambridge and Edexcel) programmes to both Chinese and foreign students.

The distinctiveness of this system lies in the fact that it does not frame “local growth” and “international development” as mutually exclusive choices, but rather as a growth trajectory that offers room for change. Students take root in Chinese culture while also acquiring the ability to seamlessly connect with global curricula—transitioning smoothly when switching educational tracks and integrating comfortably when choosing to return.

Over ten years, six graduating cohorts from the school have produced compelling results: 90% have been admitted to the world’s top 50 universities, art students have achieved a 100% admission rate to the worl’s top art institutions, and the admission rate to Hong Kong’s top five universities stands at 70%.

Currently, the school has over 2,000 students from 33 countries and regions around the world, with approximately 50% coming from overseas returnee families. This means that nearly half of the students’ families have no overseas background. They choose this school because they embrace the educational philosophy of “Chinese origins, Global originality”, and because the innovative, inclusive curriculum offers them flexible options.

July 24, 2026