WASHINGTON, D.C. – President Obama wants to quadruple the number of students learning Chinese in public schools by 2020.

Currently, there’s about 200,000 students learning Mandarin Chinese in U.S. public schools and the president wants to increase that number to 1 million by the end of the decade, the Washington Examiner reports.

The move is aimed at expanding connections between America and China to boost tourism and trade, and was announced by the president during a visit by the People’s Republic of China President Xi last week.

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“We launch a new initiative to boost tourism between our countries in the coming months,” Obama said, according to a White House transcript. “And just as children across China learn English, we’re starting a new initiative called ‘1 million Strong’ to encourage 1 million American students to learn Mandarin Chinese over the next five years.

“Vice President Biden pointed out that two of his children are already on track – two of his grandchildren, actually,” Obama continued. “After all, if our countries are going to do more together around the world, then speaking each other’s language, truly understanding each other, is a good place to start.”

The 1 Million Strong initiative is headed by a group called the 100,000 Strong Foundation, which was first established in November 2009 by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton with the goal of sending 100,000 American students to study in China. That goal was met in 2014, ForeignPolicy.com reports, so now it’s shifting focus to promoting Chinese language classes in public schools.

Foundation CEO Travis Tanner told the news site the new initiative will “create a pipeline of China-savvy employees in a range of fields” who will “ensure our trade relationship with China continues to benefit the American economy and that the future generations of American entrepreneurs, business owners, journalists, engineers, scientists, doctors, as well as government officials at both the national and state levels, will understand China.”

The initial 100,000 Strong program was funded in part through the Chinese government as part of its broader effort to spread its culture around the world. The government has partnered with American universities and other foreign schools to launch Confucius Institutes to spread its ideas and bring Chinese students to foreign schools. Those institutes have drawn criticisms from academics for a variety of reasons – from Chinese control over the professors who staff them to concerns about academic freedoms that don’t necessarily jibe with the country’s communist leadership.

But the Chinese government has also launched 357 Confucius Classrooms in American primary and secondary public schools that have also created controversy.

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“According to a January 2011 CNN report, community members in school districts in Ohio and California objected to the use of Chinese government funds to provide instruction to American students, with one calling it ‘communist propaganda,’” Foreign Policy reports.

“A domestic push to increase Chinese-language instruction and adopt a nationally accepted Mandarin curriculum may help depoliticize the issue.”

So as U.S. students continue to fall farther behind their peers in other developed countries in basic academic areas like reading, writing and math, many students will also be expected to learn Chinese, as well.

None of the media reports, press releases, or other commentary on the new program details the potential cost to taxpayers, but it’s clear it could get quite expensive.

“The effort seeks to develop Mandarin language curriculum norms, double the number of Mandarin language teachers in the U.S. and support the development of new technology platforms to enhance accessibility of language learning to remove and underserved communities,” 100,000 Strong announced in a prepared statement.

“To make 1 Million Strong a reality, (Foundation president Carola) McGiffert said the 100,000 Strong Foundation will work closely with governments and school districts across the country. The Foundation will also partner with technology and online-education leaders to ensure students, regardless of background or geography, have access to Mandarin language study.”