Taiwan Today
Date: September 2, 2016
Tran Thi Hoang Phuong, chief instructor in the Vietnamese division of the Southeastern Asian
Tran Thi Hoang Phuong (standing) teaches a Vietnamese-language class at the Foreign Language Center of National Chengchi University in Taipei City in this undated photo. (LTN)
Languages and Cultures Program at National Chengchi University in Taipei City, is busy preparing for the start of the new academic year later this month, when she and her colleagues will welcome 59 new undergraduate and graduate students from NCCU and other universities to the school’s Foreign Language Center for two- to three-year courses in Vietnamese language, culture, economics and history.
Also known by her Chinese name Chen Huang-fong, Tran is one of the foremost teachers of her mother tongue in Taiwan and the first Vietnamese faculty member at NCCU. For more than a decade, she has been working to promote cultural exchanges and understanding between locals and Vietnamese residents of the country by offering language classes at schools as well as through television and radio programs.
Tran is now helping cultivate talent for the government’s New Southbound Policy, both through her work at NCCU and through an association she founded last year to help train new immigrants from Vietnam with academic qualifications to become language teachers. The organization also introduces them to academic institutions around the country. “Highly educated immigrants can form a significant talent pool for the initiative,” she said. [FULL STORY]