On March 14, 2024, National Chengchi University (NCCU) welcomed esteemed academics and administrators participating in the Fulbright International Education Administrators Seminar. Fourteen recipients of the Fulbright International Education Administrator Award, including those from Harvard University, the University of Florida, and the University of Pennsylvania, have arrived in Taiwan for a two-week intensive group seminar.

Following a tour of the NCCU campus, Dean of Instruction, Creative Arts, Humanities, and Communication at Cuesta College, Aubrey Kuan Roderick, provided her thanks for being welcomed to NCCU and remarked on the innovative atmosphere of the NCCU campus, leaving her feeling inspired.

NCCU President Tsai-Yen Li provided the opening remarks, noting the two NCCU faculty members who currently serve on the Fulbright board and the six NCCU professors who are campus advisors.

Fulbright Director and Visiting Professor, Randall Nadeau, welcomed all attendees and noted on his time in Taiwan as a student, when he came to NCCU to conduct research at the Institute for Comparative Religions.Executive Director Nadeau stated, “NCCU is a comprehensive university representing all fields of study, all disciplines, with a very globalized faculty and a lot of ambition for the future.”

To reiterate this sentiment, Professor Josladd CK Kwai, Director at the Center for International Services and Programs at Cleveland State University and group leader for the International Education Administrators Program, stated: “we are honored by this showing [by NCCU] because just this showing demonstrates a commitment to international education.”

NCCU demonstrated this commitment in presentations on what makes NCCU different from other top schools in Taiwan. “Taiwan is in the middle of everywhere”, said Vice President of the Office of International Cooperation, Professor Ching-Ping Tang. Due to this, NCCU works hard to create connections globally, in Asia, but also with more remote areas of Taiwan.

NCCU is a “Gust Station” that blows different forms of efforts to tribal and low economic areas in the hope that NCCU graduates will settle down in these regions and bring innovation to revitalize the economy in the area. International students are also insurmountable in this effort, as they bring a deeper layer of cultural sharing to NCCU’s efforts.

Afterwards, Winnie Brophy, Director for Special Programs and Initiatives at the Center for Global Engagement at the College of Staten Island described how impressed she was with NCCU’s effort. Brophy emphasizes, as the director of international cooperation at her school, that the most successful programs are those that bridge people-to-people engagement.

Guanping Zhang, Director of the Center for Asian Studies at Middle Tennessee State University, echoed Director Brophy’s statement, stating that NCCU was unlike many experiences students have in exchange programs, as NCCU takes great effort to bring students beyond the campus to make interpersonal connections with locals living different lifestyles.

Professor Alex Chien-wu Hsueh, Vice Director of the Chinese Language Center at NCCU took to the stage later to unpack NCCU’s Chinese Language Center. NCCU’s language center hosts classroom lessons during the day and provides more intensive lessons to individual students in the afternoon. While educating international students in Mandarin from a Taiwanese perspective is one of the goals of the language center, the language center has also worked hard to bring Mandarin language textbooks that are from the perspective of a vibrant democracy, committed to intercultural exchange, to the classroom.

Prof. Hsin-Chung Liao, Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs & Director of Center for Teaching and Learning Development, also unveiled the organizational charter and mission planning of the bilingual program during the meeting. Through the collaboration of three major units: Bilingual Education and Multicultural Promotion Office,the Foreign Language Center and the Center for Teaching and Learning Development, and EMI Resource Center, not only is the final leg of college and university English learning completed. International students can also have deeper interactions with local students by participating in language learning activities, making National Chengchi University a more vibrant and multicultural campus.

It is with great honor that NCCU has had the chance to host Academics from the Fulbright International Education Administrators Program. Connections made from this seminar reaffirm the unwavering commitment to fostering global citizenship, academic excellence, and cross-cultural understanding between NCCU and international partners.