The Overseas Youth English Teaching Volunteer Service Program is hosting 594 foreigners of Taiwanese descent who are to teach at 81 elementary and junior-high schools in 16 counties this summer.
President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) had instructed that this year’s program — which is to run from Saturday to July 28 — be expanded, after it received favorable responses from overseas compatriot groups, Overseas Community Affairs Council Minister Wu Hsin-hsing (吳新興) said at a news conference yesterday.
The number of volunteers this year increased by nearly a third from about 400 last year, Wu said.
Photo: Lu Yi-hsuan, Taipei Times
The dedication of these volunteers to teaching Taiwanese students is touching, Wu said, adding that the program allows them to “bring the world to Taiwan and Taiwan to their home countries.”
“We want to thank these individuals for their dedication in laying a good foundation for the children of rural Taiwan in learning the English language,” Wu told the volunteers.
Chinese Nationalist Party Legislator Lin Li-chan (林麗蟬) said she was moved by the project.
A descendant of a migrant family, Lin said she was selected as one of the nation’s “Ten Outstanding Young Individuals” for her dedication to social service.
“It was from this distinction that I eventually worked my way into becoming a legislator,” Lin said, adding that the volunteers could one day become lawmakers in their home countries.
“To serve others is an honor; you give some, but you also learn,” Lin said.
Lin said she would like to encourage the volunteers to continue to dedicate themselves to such activities and hopes that similar camps could be set up for Mandarin Chinese and Southeast Asian languages.
The volunteers hail from the US, Canada, the UK, Australia and New Zealand, among other countries. They range in age from 17 to 25, are native English speakers and have a basic command of Mandarin.
The program started in 2004 as an event sponsored by the King Car Cultural & Educational Foundation and the council. With the involvement of the Ministry of Education in 2006, and the Hakka Affairs Council and various other non-governmental organizations in 2014, it has rapidly expanded.
To date, the program has hosted 4,820 people and has benefited more than 4,300 students in 213 schools in rural areas, the Overseas Community Affairs Council said.
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