The Chinese Students Memorial Society seeks to commemorate the Chinese Educational Commission of Chinese youth sent to study in America by the Qing Dynasty. This Commission resulted from the tireless efforts of Yong Wing [Rong Hong], who was graduated from Yale University in 1854, the first Chinese national to graduate from an American university. Upon returning to China, Yung spent many years seeking to convince the Qing officials to send Chinese youth to America to study. Over a four-year period, beginning in 1872, one-hundred and twenty students arrived in Connecticut to begin instruction in English language preparatory to their admission to universities. The Commission was abruptly terminated in 1881 by conservative mandarins who feared the students' loss of their own culture. Nevertheless, many of these students returned to China and greatly influenced China's progress in various fields during the twentieth century. The Chinese Students Memorial Society sponsors educational programs to inform both the Chinese-American community, and the public at large, about an important period in China's development and the contribution of the students and their American sponsors to Chinese - American relations. The Society seeks the establishment and maintenance of appropriate commemorative monuments and the support for research and the dissemination of literature to foster the friendship and mutual respect of the people of China and America.