Meet Eveline Ma of HeartLingua Education Services

Today we’d like to introduce you to Eveline Ma.

Hi Eveline, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Before moving into education, I spent many years working in radio journalism and corporate communications in Taiwan. Because of my husband’s research career, our family lived in Europe and Japan before eventually moving to Cleveland in 2019.

My journey into Mandarin teaching began from a very personal place. As a parent, I would like to help heritage children growing up overseas, including my own child, stay connected to the Chinese language and culture. At the same time, I was looking to build a meaningful second career centered around communication, education, and community.

Along the way, I met my wonderful partner, Erica Wang, who shared the same passion for language education and cultural exchange. Together, we noticed a gap in Greater Cleveland: many adults were eager to learn Mandarin but struggled to find programs designed for them. Most local resources focused primarily on youth education. That realization led us to found HeartLingua Education Services, a nonprofit organization dedicated to adult Mandarin learning and cultural engagement.

At HeartLingua, our goal is to create an engaging and supportive environment where students feel comfortable, confident, and genuinely excited to speak Mandarin. What makes us different is that we go beyond language instruction. We integrate cultural experiences, from calligraphy and festivals to food, arts, and social traditions, so students not only learn the language, but also gain a deeper understanding of Chinese-speaking cultures and societies.

We’re still a small organization, but our community means everything to us. Some students have been learning with us for years, bringing along friends and family members to join classes or cultural events. Seeing students grow in confidence, discover new perspectives, and build meaningful connections through language — that is the most rewarding part of what we do.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Starting a nonprofit organization focused on language education and cultural exchange — with very limited resources and no large institutional backing — has definitely not been easy.

One of our biggest challenges has been finding classroom space. At a critical stage in our growth, we suddenly lost access to the facility we had been using, while a new semester was approaching quickly. Finding a venue within a short timeframe that was safe, comfortable, accessible, and affordable felt overwhelming and became one of our greatest sources of stress.

What carried us through was community support. During that period, our students and friends offered encouragement, ideas, and connections. We were especially grateful to the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Cleveland, whose generosity allowed us to use meeting rooms in their church so our classes could continue.

That experience taught us an important lesson: building a mission-driven organization means building a “trust account.” Reliability, professionalism, and authentic relationships matter deeply. The trust of students, partners, and the community becomes one of our most valuable assets.

Another ongoing challenge is visibility. Social media is one of our most important marketing channels, but algorithms are constantly changing, and AI is reshaping how people discover information and educational resources. Staying visible without losing our identity is a real balancing act.

Rather than chasing volume or trends, we’ve chosen a multi-platform approach focused on meaningful, high-quality content — content that genuinely speaks to Mandarin learners and reflects who we are as educators and cultural advocates.

Looking back, the journey hasn’t been smooth, but every challenge has strengthened our sense of purpose, adaptability, and appreciation for the community that continues to support us.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about HeartLingua Education Services?
HeartLingua Education Services is a nonprofit organization dedicated to adult Mandarin education and cultural exchange. Our name, HeartLingua, reflects what we believe in: “Speak Mandarin with Heart. Experience Culture with Joy.”

Our teachers are professionally trained in Mandarin instruction, and we focus on systematic, interactive learning that helps students use Mandarin confidently in real life — whether for family, travel, work, or personal growth.

Our student body is wonderfully diverse—we have busy professionals from healthcare, technology, education, retail, and hospitality who carve out time from their hectic schedules to pursue their passion for Mandarin. The greatest pride is our end-of-semester showcase. Watching these incredibly busy adults stand confidently in front of their families and friends, delivering speeches, singing, and performing in Mandarin, is incredibly moving.

Over the years, we’ve witnessed the beautiful real-world impact of our classes:

■Bridging Families: We’ve seen intercultural romances flourish. Some of our students have shared the joy of being able to chat with their partner’s parents in Mandarin for the first time, bringing tears of joy to their families.

■Experiencing Culture Firsthand: Students have traveled to Taiwan and told us how their classroom cultural lessons suddenly came alive in the vibrant streets of Taipei.

■Creative Expression: One of our students even turned a Chinese story they wrote into a picture book and gifted it to us — one of the most touching gifts we’ve ever received

Beyond grammar and vocabulary, we believe language and culture are inseparable. We design immersive cultural workshops—such as calligraphy and stone seal engraving—to help students appreciate the visual history of Traditional Chinese characters. We explore traditional arts like Chinese painting, oil dyeing, and shadow puppetry, and bring culinary traditions to life by teaching students how to make dumplings, zongzi, and mooncakes. We even teach strategic thinking through traditional games like Mahjong and Xiangqi. These events are open to families and friends; we’ve loved hearing about families now wrapping dumplings together at home to celebrate New Year, or students gifting hand-engraved seals to their loved ones.

Finally, we are deeply committed to stepping out of the classroom to enrich the Greater Cleveland community.

■We partner with the Cuyahoga County Public Library (Beachwood Branch) to host hands-on family events celebrating Lunar New Year and the Mid-Autumn Festival.

■We have participated in the Cleveland Asian Festival for consecutive years, showcasing the beauty of Traditional Chinese characters.

■On Asian Heritage Day, we proudly share the rich history and modern vibrancy of Taiwan.

These face-to-face interactions allow us to connect with the local community, spark curiosity about Mandarin, Chinese culture and Taiwan, and give back to the city that has welcomed us so warmly. The smiles and heartfelt feedback we receive at these events are what keep us moving forward.

Any advice for finding a mentor or networking in general?
There is a Chinese saying we deeply relate to: 「教學相長」(jiào xué xiāng zhǎng) — teaching and learning enhance one another.

That idea has become one of the most meaningful lessons from building HeartLingua.

Although Mandarin is our native language, teaching it well requires humility, preparation, and constant learning. We never take our knowledge for granted. Every lesson plan, classroom discussion, and student question challenges us to think more carefully about how to make language accurate, practical, and truly accessible. Our students’ feedback continually pushes us to grow as educators.

But the learning goes far beyond language.

Through classroom conversations about culture, family, traditions, values, and social perspectives, we’ve learned to better understand and respect the different worlds our students come from — and, in turn, they gain a deeper understanding of ours. Some of the most meaningful moments in our classroom happen when curiosity replaces assumptions and people discover unexpected common ground.

To us, this is the deeper purpose of language education. It is not only about vocabulary, grammar, or pronunciation. It is about building human connection. It is about creating bridges across cultures, experiences, and communities.

In many ways, HeartLingua has taught us just as much as we have taught our students — and we feel incredibly grateful for that journey.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.heartlingua.org/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/heartlinguamandarin
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/heartlingua-mandarin
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@HeartLinguaMandarin