Taiwan News
Date: May 10, 2016
A seminar on conducting teacher development programs in Southeast Asian languages was
Offspring of Southeast Asian immigrants in New Taipei City are all smiles at the prospects of leading Taiwan’s efforts to expand its economic footprint in Southeast Asia. (Staff photo/Huang Chung-hsin)
held for the first time May 6 in central Taiwan’s Nantou County by the Ministry of Education, underscoring the commitment of the government to strengthening the country’s ties with Southeast Asia.
Conducted under the MOE’s New Inhabitants Talent-Developing Project launched in December last year, the seminar aims to help schools provide courses in Southeast Asian languages for Taiwan’s elementary and high schoolers by 2018. It is expected that students, especially the nation’s 250,000 children of immigrants from Southeast Asia, will develop language skills enabling them to play a key role in growing Taiwan’s economic footprint in Southeast Asia.
According to the latest MOE statistics, the number of Southeast Asians studying in Taiwan was 26,000 last year, or 24 percent of all overseas students in Taiwan, up 13 percent from 2014. In comparison the number of people from Taiwan studying in the region was less than 3,000.
Rebecca Lan, deputy director-general of MOE’s Department of International and Cross-strait Education said in this era of globalization, Taiwan’s younger generations should engage more with the world, especially nations in Southeast Asia achieving consistent economic growth and crying out for talent. “Some young people view Southeast Asia as a tourist destination, but there could be a sea change in this thinking if they studied, interned or worked there.” [FULL STORY
