The spread of COVID-19 has changed the traditional education pattern, and prolonged home isolation and online learning have brought unprecedented challenges to second language teaching and learning. A sample of 1036 Chinese students from four representative middle schools participated in the research. The results indicated four motivations: intrinsic interest, learning situation, personal development, and immediate achievement. There were significant gender differences in English learning motivation. Moreover, intrinsic interest and personal development motivation had a significantly positive impact on English learning achievement, while learning situation had no significant impact, and immediate achievement motivation had a significantly negative impact. The findings highlight the cultivation of students’ learning autonomy and school-family interaction to promote the sustainable development of middle school students’ second language learning.

This study examined the English learning motivation of Chinese ethnic university students. A sample of 776 undergraduates from three representative ethnic universities participated in this research. The findings indicated four types of English learning motivation: intrinsic interest, learning situation, personal development, and international communication. There were statistically significant differences between ethnic minority and Han students, and between male and female students. Moreover, the intrinsic interest motivation of Han students was significantly higher than that of ethnic minority students, and female students’ overall motivation and personal development motivation were significantly higher than those of male students. Intrinsic interest motivation had a significantly positive impact on English achievement, whereas learning situation motivation had a significantly negative impact. These findings highlight the improvement of the learning situation and encouragement of intrinsic interest to enhance minority students’ second language learning and sustainable development. Further research on English as a second language should consider the influence of family and ethnic background.

The Education Partnership Assistance (EPA) is an institutional arrangement that has played an important role in the balanced and sustainable development of higher education in China, in which universities of East China provide the paired universities in West China with various assistance. EPA is part of the political commitment made by the Chinese government to fulfil sustainable and balanced development. By applying a policy process framework and qualitative text analysis to the government and universities’ official documents, we find EPA is primarily based on the Communist Party of China (CPC)’s ideological cornerstones of “common prosperity”. Over the past two decades, by conducting leadership secondment, faculty and student training, and ICT and library development, EPA has improved the development of universities in West China, and the central government’s current emphasis remains on the continuation of EPA. However, this paper argues that EPA cannot be going on indefinitely and that true sustainability is contingent on the capacity building of the recipient universities, rather than on the endless assistance from supporting universities. EPA is a localized action to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in China. It sheds light on the connections between domestic aid and the SDGs from a supplementary perspective.