The National Science and Technology Council introduce measures to implement the vital policy "To create a fertile ground for talents to grow and enrich Taiwan's scientific research talent pool." These measures, which involved actively cultivating talents in internationalization and national key fields, promote links between scholars and experts and the international research community and lay a foundation for talents in critical fields. By bolstering Taiwan's humanities and social science research capabilities to realize Taiwan's technological vision of "innovation, inclusiveness, and sustainability."
The number of Taiwanese students studying in the United States in the humanities and social sciences is decreasing year by year, from 128 in 103 to only 55 in 110, according to the statistics of the U.S. National Science Foundation. To address the problem of a succession gap following the lack of Taiwanese research talents in humanities and social sciences and improve the connection between overseas academic communities and Taiwan. The National Science and Technology Council has promoted four editions of the "Taiwanese Overseas Pioneers Grants" (TOP Grants) since 2018. So far, the grants have been given to 85 doctoral candidates and 20 young scholars. On the foundation of this training program, the scholars who completed the training service in academic institutions worldwide have continued to devote time and effort to overseas Taiwanese intellectual capacity.
Today, the National Science and Technology Council held a press conference for the fourth edition of the program in which students who have completed the program or are currently training overseas to share their academic research journey and research theme. To demonstrate the high academic value of integrating theory and practice in humanity and social sciences and the aspiration of focusing on the global.
Participants include Lin-Fang Hsu, a Ph.D. candidate at University College London. Aiming to contribute to regional-level social and economic development, she combines evolutionary economic geography and smart city in her thesis. Dr. Yun-Wen Chan is an assistant professor at Texas State University. She focuses on applying deliberative democracy to discuss local sustainability issues. The book she is writing presents a teaching mode generated from a Taiwanese place-based curriculum case and applied in the US classroom.
Passing down the results and success stories of the program over the years, the National Science and Technology Council Taiwanese Overseas Pioneers Grants (TOP Grants) will continue to assist young research talents in humanities and social sciences who are studying or teaching overseas to focus on writing their doctoral dissertations or academic books, improve the quality of their academic research, and gradually establish a global academic network for overseas research talents from Taiwan, thereby strengthening Taiwan's status and influence in the field of humanities and social sciences in international academic circles.
This program is primarily geared toward "doctoral candidates" and "young scholars." The former includes doctoral candidates studying for a doctoral degree overseas; the latter are full-time teachers or researchers of overseas academic and research institutions. The financial support allows overseas scholars to focus on writing papers and scholarly books, helping them gain a foothold in international academic circles, thus laying a solid foundation for humanities and social sciences research.
The 2022 grant recipients have been announced on the program's website. A total of 25 doctoral candidates and 5 young scholars were selected to receive training subsidies of NT$900 thousand and NT$600 thousand during their year-long study period, respectively. Young scholars can also apply for an additional NT$200 thousand academic book publishing subsidy.
The National Science and Technology Council also announced that the new edition of the program is scheduled to start in late April 2023 with additional recruitment quotas. Scholars in humanities and social sciences who meet the application requirements are welcome to keep an eye on the program's website for relevant information and send in their applications.