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In January, I posted the abstract for the paper I will be presenting at the 2008 International Conference and Workshop on TEFL & Applied Linguistics to be held at Ming Chuan University March 14-15. You can download a slightly edited version of the paper here.
I missed this when it came out, but my colleague Paul Hyder was kind enough to direct me to the article.
Tony Chen, described as the president of Taichung Foreign Language Service Association, told the China Post that as many as 40% of foreign teachers may have fake diplomas. How Tony knows this, I have no idea. In fact, I am quite sure it is not true. Before I taught at MCU, I taught for many years in buxibans and while there are many 'fake foreign teachers', it is no where near one in two. I suspect he is making up this number for the purpose of illustration. It is a fabrication meant to create the impression of crisis.
The article tells the story of Hungkuang University in Taichung which was involved in a controversial episode last year. Apparently, they hired a foreign professor who fraudulently claimed to hold a PhD in Linguistics. Both Paul's article and this one state that the fraudulent professor was paid $nt2 million before he left. I am not certain what this means. If it is referring to salary he received before he was discovered, this would mean he worked at the school for more than a year before he was discovered.
Hungkuang University is a family-operated institution located in Taichung County. The article from the China Post implies the story is somehow connected to the problem of fake credentials at buxibans. This makes me laugh. The process of hiring foreign professors is identical to the process of hiring local professors and very different from hiring buxiban teachers. If the school was in error of hiring someone, it is because they were careless. As the MOE's Yang Yu-hui (楊玉惠) points out in this article in Taiwan Headlines,
Hungkuang University must shoulder the entire responsibility for hiring this bogus professor. It is hard to believe a school of such caliber would be so careless during the hiring process.
If this reflects anything, it is that even small schools better served by classroom teachers are under huge pressure from the MOE to hire PhDs to teach even basic classes.
One final point. Tony Chen is an extremely common name, so I can't be sure who this Tony is. However, several years back, a Taichung-based English teach named Tony Chen was involved in a publicity stunt that included a proposal of marriage to the vice-president Annette Lu.
To date, I have only been able to talk with university administrators and professors about education in Asia. I have been trying for some time to get student's opinions on studying in Taiwan and Asia as a foreign student, but until recently have not been able to get any. In my last post about international students, a comment was left by M. Dujon Johnson. Mr. Johnson has a blog about his experience as a foreign student
His on-line biography describes him as
...a Sinologist, lawyer and author. I am currently conducting research for my second book on international law concerning the U.S., Mainland China and Taiwanese triangular relationship; I am also a world-class 10k runner. I received my Bachelor of Arts and Juris Doctor degrees from the University of Iowa and my Master of Arts from the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor. I am currently a visiting scholar at the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy and a Ph.D. student at National Sun Yat-sen University located in Taiwan, Republic of China. I was only the third African-American to study at Nanjing University in Mainland China. I am the first African-American Ph.D. student to study at National Sun Yat-sen University and the first African-American Ph.D. student at the Institute of Mainland China Studies. I am also, you guessed it, the first African-American to be named a visiting scholar by the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy.
In his comment, he compares the financial aid situation for foreign students in Taiwan and China
I can provide some information concerning fees and tuition. I have been a student or taught in Mainland China, Taiwan and U.S. universities at the undergraduate, graduate and professional [law] levels. I think that it is important to remember if a student comes to Taiwan and his/her standard of living is like that of local students, then these fees are not trivial and could be very burdensome financially. In both the U.S. and Mainland China when I was matriculating as a student, the amount of tuition costs varied greatly between the two nations. However, all fees and tuition were covered in full plus a monthly stipend was given on top of this in both Mainland China and the U.S. As an MOE recipient here in Taiwan, fees and tuition are paid out of student's pocket. That is the stipend is given to the student and then s/he must pay their fees; most foreign students see this as 'hidden fees' because this is not always made clear when a student is deciding to come to Taiwan on a scholarship. I think the main difference is, from my standpoint, that a student can very easily lose his or her scholarship for non-academic reasons (e.g., attendance which may vary from professor to professor, taking an authorized sabbatical to do research, grades or incompletes given by instructor of college due to administrative mix-ups, etc.). In Mainland China and the U.S., once a scholarship is given, it is rarely taken away or altered. In short, the granting of a scholarship in the U.S. and Mainland China is seen as a legally binding contract. In Taiwan it is not.
In a further comment, Mr. Johnson sums up his opinion
Coming to Taiwan was probably one of the worst decisions that I have made.
I have been on vacation in Canada for the past few weeks and not posting anything on my blog. I hadn't planned on posting anything until next week, but an article in today's Taipei Times caught my attention. The article was about the rising number of foreign students in Taiwan. Information cited in the article appears to come from an AIT-sponsored event called Internationalizing the University Campus: Sharing Experiences and Best Practices, and you can find transcripts of the event here.
As readers here know, my opinion of programs in Taiwan set up to attract foreign students is quote positive. I have pointed out that National Cheng Kung University IMBA offers a competitive English-medium education. I have also discussed positive aspects of the English taught programs at Ming Chuan University. It is thus with some surprise that I read the Taipei Tiomes article.
The article states that there are 17,742 foreign studuents studying in Taiwan at the moment. This is an all-time high. Citing Jennie Wu (
Sure, we all know that anyone in Taiwan must be here because it's friendly people, free society, and the delicious food. Besides, as we are relentlessly told in the Taipei Times, Mandarin is the emerging world language. We all know this. But the numbers in the article don't make any sense. Over five thousand (5,259) of these students are enrolled in degree programs. The article cites MCU as one the schools at which large numbers of these degree-seeking students are enrolled. But I know for a fact that no more than a handful of the foreign students at MCU are enrolled in Chinese-language programs. My assumption is that almost all the foreign students seeking degrees in Taiwan are here because of these English-taught programs. And as true as that is, it should not go unstated that these degree-seeking foreign students are not paying tuition. In fact, many of them would be actually making money for studying here.
But the article is confusing about what the 17,000+ number really indicates. Citing Dr. Ellen Chen (
The article provides some numbers for students in Taiwan study Mandarin. Once again, it is not clear to me what these numbers mean. The article claims that somewhere around 10,177 students are enrolled in Taiwan studying Mandarin, most of whom appear to be studying at the National Normal University. Somewhere in this calculation, the article has lost more than 2,000 students (10,177 studying Mandarin + 5,259 studying for degree does not equal the 17,742 foreign students studying in Taiwan). Where these students could be and what they are studying is puzzling, although some of this difference may be found in the time period accounted for with the figures.
In addition, there is the issue of visas. Almost all of the language students would hold a tourist visa and not a student visa. I am not certain how meaningful it is to count these two groups together and try to analyze their motivations when one of them is composed of tourists who are paying full cost for their education and the other is composed of student visa holders who are studying for free.
My point is that the comments from this event are meaningless. Other than functioning as a press statement, it is not clear what this event was supposed to accomplish. Talking about the friendliness of the Taiwanese people and how students come here to see democracy is meaningless when the fact is they are studying here for free. Unless the Ministry of Education intends to pay for students forever, none of this is going to help Taiwan compete with Japan, where thousand of students are completing degrees that they had to pay for or with Singapore where vast numbers of foreign students are studying even though they have to pay higher fees than local students (also see here).
While there may be good quality programs available in Taiwan, believing they are successful because students like the happy, healthy atmosphere of Taiwan is just plain foolish.
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