A project aimed at nurturing intellectuals and technocrats for the country in research institutes abroad is expected to kick off by the end of this year, an official with the Council of Economic Planning and Development (CEPD) said yesterday.
Operations of the new elite-building project -- to be jointly sponsored by the CEPD, the Ministry of Education and the National Science Council (NSC) -- is expected to begin in December at the latest to begin accepting applications by Taiwanese students hoping to pursue advanced studies with state funding in research institutes abroad, mainly the US, according to CEPD Vice Chairman Hsieh Fa-ta (
Under the program, potential government scholarship winners can choose their subjects for advanced studies in institutes abroad under three major research areas -- fundamental sciences, humanistic and social studies, and national development -- that a guiding committee of the project has mapped out.
Under the three major areas, there will be 12 research fields for the applicants to choose from. These fields include biotechnology, image display, digital content, telecom technology, semiconductors, energy technology, environment and natural disasters, nanotechnology and cutting-edge materials, international law and politics, as well as arts and history, Hsieh added.
He noted that a group of officials and academics, including Minister of Education Tu Cheng-sheng (
Quite a few valuable solutions were concluded during the meetings that will serve as guidelines when the project is implemented, Hsieh said.
The program was initiated earlier this year after the government became aware that there is an ever-growing gap between Taiwan's educational sector and the industrial sector in terms of quality and quantity of supplies of expert manpower.
The government decided to allow more Taiwanese students to seek advanced studies abroad with government funding in an effort to reverse the trend.
In a recent speech, Premier Yu Shyi-kun quoted a research report by the Council for Cultural Affairs as indicating that Taiwan's high-tech industrial sector as a whole has 6,100 openings for various jobs this year that are still unfilled and that the manpower shortage is expected to top 10,000 individuals next year.
Yu said that Taiwan's high-tech industrial sector -- a driving force pushing Taiwan to become one of the world's economic powerhouses -- was established and is nurtured by high-caliber scientists and specialists who returned to Taiwan after obtaining advanced degrees abroad.
In recent years, however, the number of Taiwan students going abroad for higher education, particularly to the US, has continued to drop, Yu said. This is a situation about which the government is most concerned, he added.
According to government tallies, a total of 13,767 Taiwan students went to the US for advanced studies in 2002, compared with 10,324 students last year, marking a whopping decline of 25 percent.
Hsieh said that there are a variety of factors behind the decline, including the fact that more and more Taiwan college graduates continued their studies at Taiwan graduate schools, while the considerable increase in the numbers of students from China and South Korea seeking advanced studies in the US is another factor adversely affecting the enrollment of students from Taiwan.
RSS