Under the leadership of the founder Dr. Clement C. P. Chang and the succeeding presidents in the past fifty years, Tamkang has already become the head of the higher education in the country. "Information-oriented education" has always been one of the policies for the development of the school. Now, Tamkang won the high recognition by "Webometrics Ranking of World University" for her achievement in digitalization of academic and administrative affairs and well-developed internet networks. It ranks the 463rd in the world, and at 1st in Taiwan’s private schools. This shows the great achievements of our “information-oriented education” that Tamkang has been promoting for years.

Besides establishing the great digital environment, Tamkang also maneuvers a visionary strategy and distinguished vision. We set up “cyber campus” as one of our campuses paving the way for students’ worldview with electronic technology and information networks. We create a far-reaching learning environment so that students can enjoy using various kinds of resources to fulfill the dream of lifelong learning. In order to realize the vision of digital learning, we give an impetus to the user-friendly and technologic cyber learning field to the learners. On account of the teaching excellence project that the Ministry of Education encourages, we integrate the library with the Information Processing Center and Distance Education Development Section to bring up the individual projects of “creating the digital education on ‘cyber campus.” This project includes “designing the cyber teaching materials with good quality,” “performing the cyber teaching with good quality,” “strengthening the digital teaching resources and environment,” and “providing with multiple-teaching services.” On the basis of our experiences and outcomes of digital learning these years, we can strengthen teachers’ teaching skills and lead the students to acquire advanced learning so that we will build “the space of knowledge explorer” with far-reaching knowledge through the execution of the project.

Our distance courses are planned and executed by Distance Education Development Section under the supervision by Developing Committee of Distance Education. From the academic year of 1999 to the first semester of the academic year of 2007, there have been 280 main broadcasting courses and 40 courses of other schools, and the sum of the students are around 25,000. In the recent years, we are more active to arrange and develop the international distance education. For example, it is meaningful to our development of distance education to have the Cross-Cultural Distance Learning (CCDL) with Waseda University. Furthermore, Ministry of Education has highly recognized the outcomes of our development of digital learning. In the “project of visiting and examining of digital learning in colleges in the year of 2005,” the evaluation included digital contents, digital courses (the design of the learning activities, teaching management, system services) and digital institution. Tamkang won the appreciation that “the performance of Tamkang is superior to other evaluated schools, and it is worthy to be the example of other schools.” The distinguished performance of our distance education is really well-deserved. In 2006, Ministry of Education reviewed and approved two E-Learning Executive Master’s Program of Business Administration (EMBA) in Global Chinese Management and E-Learning Executive Master’s Program in Educational Technology, and we pioneer the “cyber campus” with a digital academic degree.

On the development of “cyber campus,” there are three main parts: 1. national and international distance education, 2. cyber degrees, programs and credit courses, 3. global Chinese cyber school and non-credit courses, so that they can satisfy the needs of the three markets: studying (Market I), studying at work (Market II) and lifetime learning (Market III.) Therefore, we will both cultivate national markets and put efforts to promote Chinese language worldwide. In the future, we will take “global Chinese cyber school” as the main gateway to oversea export, and apply the strategic alliance with American teacher education institute to organize Chinese Teacher Education Courses together. In this way, students will have the opportunity to have the practical training in the States, and the students will become a Chinese teacher there. Besides this, we finished developing the calligraphy system of “E-pen” by using a computer pencil on the flat-board computer or writing on the board by hands to simulate different kinds of characters with the shape of a ball-point pen, a felt pen, or a Chinese writing brush. Besides, the system can apply to learning and practicing characters, painting, and even applying to digital learning. And it also attempts to have access to the formal educational system in the States by the cooperation with the industry and the school.

Thomas L. Friendman says that “the world is flat.” Due to the development of information and cyber technology, the world constantly condenses and turns flat. The knowledge networks of the world have become a single network, which enters into the new era of innovation and prosperity, and brings more opportunities and competitions. Tamkang has already fully recognized the trend of digital learning, and created numerous leading landmarks on Taiwan’s advanced education. Tamkang is also superior to other colleges of the country in the field of the digital learning. In the future, we will attempt to organize and establish a cyber academy, and to imitate the industry modes of strength and excellence. It is our expectation that during the anniversary of 60th year of our school, we will complete the establishment of “cyber campus.” Let Tamkang directly connect with other “cyber campus” of the world, and standing on the pitcher’s mound of the digital learning with a remarkable “Sinker”. ( ~Shu-chun Yen )