Fewer vocational students are persuing degrees in English or applied English departments, while the number of students studying Japanese or Korean has jumped, a Ministry of Education study showed.
Students learning foreign languages at vocational schools last year dropped to 66,000, or 5.3 percent of the student population nationwide, the Chinese-language United Daily News reported on Friday, citing the ministry’s study.
The peak was in 2006, when 82,000 students, or 6.2 percent of students nationwide, studied languages, it said.
Photo: Lin Hsiao-yun, Taipei Times
Last year, 40,000 vocational students, or 61 percent of those nationwide, studied English, followed by 16,000, or 24.5 percent, studying Japanese, it said.
Compared with 10 years ago, the number of students learning English has fallen by 14,000, while the number of students learning Japanese has increased by 351 and the number learning Korean has increased by 84, it said.
There has been a growing trend in the number of students interested in Japanese, Chang Shoou-huey (張守慧), dean of the College of European and Asian Languages at Wenzao Ursuline University, was quoted as saying.
Next year’s Olympic Games in Tokyo could offer Taiwanese students many internship opportunities, she added.
More students are also interested in Korean, Chang said, adding that more students are registering to take Japanese or Korean courses, or even seeking to complete a double major in Japanese and Korean.
Japanese clubs and Korean clubs at vocational schools are also gaining popularity, she added.
Southeast Asian languages are also becoming more popular as majors at vocational schools, especially as some students have immigrant parents, Chang said, adding that the commercial potential of knowing ASEAN languages has prompted students to pick up Indonesian, Thai and Vietnamese.
Among European languages, more students prefer German, compared with Spanish or French, Chang said, adding that the reason might be that many EU-related agencies moved to continental Europe — especially Germany — after the Brexit referendum passed in 2016.
Employment opportunities and lower tuition have made Germany an appealing choice for students at Wenzao hoping to complete a double degree program, she said, referring to a program in which a student works to fulfill the degree requirements at two universities at the same time.
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