The Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) and the Ministry of Education (MOE) co-hosted four recruitment seminars in the United States to draw academics from abroad into the Taiwanese scientific community. After wrapping up the third seminar on April 5th, Minister of Science and Technology Chen Liang-Gee traveled to Boston on April 7th with Deputy Minister of Education Yao Leeh-Ter—as well as several top officials from the MOST, the MOE, and the presidents of 10 top-ranked universities in Taiwan—to conduct the final seminar, where numerous young, talented individuals engaged in a lively exchange with the university presidents.
The final recruitment seminar was hosted in Boston, one of the oldest cities in the United States. The city’s economy hinges on the education, financial, healthcare, and technology sectors. It is also home to two of the world’s best-known higher education institutions, Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which enroll students from across the world in a range of academic programs and have produced numerous winners of the Nobel Prize, the National Medal of Science, the Pulitzer Prize, the Academy Awards, the MacArthur Fellowship, the Fields Medal, and the Turing Award.
In the Boston seminar, the MOST and MOE delegations met with representatives from the Chinese American Academic and Professional Society, the Chinese Institute of Engineers – the Boston Taiwanese Biotechnology Association, and the Monte Jade Science and Technology Association of New England to foster bilateral academic exchange and cooperation, thereby enabling coordination of technological and academic resources between Taiwan and the East Coast. Through these recruitment seminars, as well as several accompanying networking events, we envision a deepened cooperation between Taiwan and academic institution and startups in the United States.
Minister of Science and Technology Chen, Liang-Gee stated that the recruitment effort focused on promoting the MOST’s Young Scholar Fellowship Program and the MOE’s Yushan Project to bring up-and-coming young academics from abroad to teach and conduct research at Taiwan’s universities, thereby contributing to the betterment of the Taiwanese higher education sector, the nation’s technological advancement, and its visibility in the academia. These recruitment seminars, with over 500 attendees, represent Taiwan’s continued efforts to attract scholars from around the world and assist Taiwanese people working or studying overseas in making important career decisions. The MOST and the MOE are striving to reshape Taiwan into an environment conducive to academic research and innovation—one in which promising young researchers can make their voices heard in the international community.
