To sharpen the language proficiency of its students, the National Defense University has hired eight foreign teachers for courses in French, Spanish, Arabic, German and other languages, a Ministry of National Defense (MND) official said yesterday.
The move was part of a project between the school and National Chengchi University that began this year and is overseen by the ministry, the official said.
The eight teachers were recommended by National Chengchi University, which has a College of Foreign Languages and Literature, and they come from France, Dominica, Austria, Russia, Jordan, Japan and South Korea, the official said.
They would initially be employed for one year, and Chengchi is to send inspectors to examine whether their classes are helping students, the official said.
The plan is a major effort to improve the language skills of students who are to become military officers, Deputy Minister of National Defense Shen Yi-ming (沈一鳴) said on Thursday last week, when he offered letters of appointment to the eight teachers at a ceremony at the defense university.
The ministry began working with National Taiwan Normal University last year to establish a program for Englilsh-language oral interpretation of military affairs, which allows students to practice their interpretation skills in drills, Shen said.
The training has been useful, he said.
The Chung Cheng Armed Forces Preparatory School has also employed several foreign language teachers and opened two language programs for its senior high students to improve their skills in foreign languages before they enroll in the nation’s military academies.
It has also organized a study tour of US military academies, and plans to select 13 officers or students for the 12-day tour, the school said.
The preparatory school’s junior-high section, which was suspended for 14 years, resumed admitting students this year.
It has also sought to appeal to prospective students by promoting its foreign-language courses and camping activities.
Although English courses are a requirement at the preparatory school, students can also take other foreign language as an elective.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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