Language No Object for Taiwan's Foreign Students!

Antonio Beardall hails from the Central American nation of Belize, which is a member of the British Commonwealth. He earned an associate's degree there and worked in a museum and then in the National Institute of Culture and History before coming to Taiwan to continue his studies. His job involved the management and care of archeological artifacts, but the archeological research methods employed in Belize are rather out of date, and there are no related programs in the universities there, so he applied for a five-year Taiwan Scholarship to study at the Department of Information and Library Science at Tamkang University. He is the first foreigner ever to enroll in that department.

"At first, my instructors didn't know what to do with me," recalls Beardall, who is now in his third year. Although he had a year of Chinese study under his belt, he couldn't follow his classes. Some kind-hearted instructors would stop halfway through a lecture or discussion and use English to explain to him. But he found it awkward and embarrassing to have all eyes on him, so he ended up devising a method that suited both him and his professors.

"When I was a freshman, I was 27 years old and had already worked in a related field, and my Western education was different from the experience of my Taiwanese classmates, so professors ended up giving me a lot of leeway and flexibility. They provided reading lists, and when I had questions I consulted with them. For exams, I mostly answered questions in English, or submitted papers in their place."

Beardall says that after three years in the program, he has gained professional knowledge from his classes on library classification, databases and backup methods, and also taken great strides in raising his own abilities to do research. He is confident that after he returns home, he will be able to put his newfound knowledge and skills to work.

Pavel Kocourek, a Czech graduate student at National Sun Yat-Sen University in Kaohsiung, offers another happy tale of productive independent study.

As an undergraduate Kocourek majored in math and won a prize at the International Math Olympics. After he graduated from college, he let the deadline pass for applying to graduate schools in Europe. But he loves to travel, so at the urging of his girlfriend, who was fascinated by Chinese, he applied for a two-year Taiwan Scholarship for graduate studies at NSYSU.

He himself had no foundation in Chinese. With an attitude that this was "adventure travel," Kocourek didn't have big expectations in terms of academics. He first found two foreign-national teachers in the department to serve as his advisors. Unfortunately, a Greek instructor who was a good fit with Kocourek resigned during the student's second semester there. The other foreign instructor was Vietnamese, and Kocourek got on well with him too, but the instructor's research focus was too theoretical to hold Kocourek's interest. Kocourek felt bad that he couldn't help the professor with his research.

As a result of a chance encounter, Kocourek met Frank Ying, the dean of the university's Office of International Affairs and a professor of economics. Ying discovered that Kocourek was both naturally gifted at math and also motivated to work hard at solving problems, so Ying invited him to research under him.

"We were asked by the Council for Economic Planning and Development to carry out some research that required large amounts of mathematical computations," Ying explains. The work involved dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) modeling, a cutting-edge realm internationally. The aim was to develop a dynamic model to predict economic trends. For instance, how would releasing consumer vouchers at different times affect the Taiwan economy? Or if the exchange rate for the NT dollar went up by 1%, how would that affect the unemployment rate? Using DSGE you can design enormous models and account for multiple variables. The programs are very difficult to write, and the complicated software often causes computers to crash, but Kocourek, with his high level of mathematical ability, is highly skilled at resolving thorny problems like those.

"He's the brightest student I've come across in 15 years. He's practically a genius!" Ying declares. Kocourek himself feels that he's found his path in life. He has thrown himself into the research, often working at his computer deep into the night, totally captivated by the task at hand.

"I'm more than just a student to Frank. Whenever I go to Taipei, I always stay at his place!" says the smiling Kocourek. By letting him make such a big contribution to the research, Ying has given the student a sense of his own true worth. Kocourek has ended up getting much more out of his trip to Taiwan than he had anticipated.