Edward Knapp, CEO of the Hello! Haigeng MiniGolf Park in the suburbs of Kunming, Yunnan province , is facing a tough challenge. He is making a presentation to the principal and some 35 teachers of Xiaodong Primary School about a unique concept - bringing school work out of the classroom and into an outdoor environment with mini-golf as the medium.
His problem is attempting to translate to mainland educators a concept that's groundbreaking even in Europe and the United States.
But Xiaodong Primary is up for the challenge, hoping to get Education Bureau approval for a rooftop mini- golf course. If the proposal gets the green light, Xiaodong Primary will be the second on the mainland - and in the world, according to the World Minigolf Sport Federation - to build a course on its campus, and to incorporate the sport into its curriculum.
Anning Experimental Middle School in Yunnan was the first. Some 35 kilometres northwest of Kunming, the school's sprawling campus is home to about 3,000 students. And the mini-golf course there - still under construction - is the latest addition to facilities that include a planetarium and a weather station.
The Anning school may be pulling off an educational world first. But, as a tool for teaching, there are precedents: The Hall of Science Rocket Park Mini Golf in New York - complete with real Nasa rockets - teaches astrophysics to young people on an interactive course. Meanwhile, the Big Backyard, at the Science Museum of Minnesota, US, is a nine-hole course that teaches young people how water moves from the mountains to the sea and creates landscapes as it flows.
But the Anning course is in some ways even more ambitious. When it is completed in June, the 18-hole, tournament-class course will take students on a journey through our planetary system, natural weather patterns, sustainable water resources management, urban planning and 14 other environmental subjects.
Mike Medcalf, a 28-year-old engineering graduate who grew up partly in Hong Kong and now lives in Kunming, explains how every hole on a mini-golf course can act as a lesson.