At this difficult and chilling time, the Office of Alumni Service and Resources Development has brought good news for TKU graduates. The MOE has

worked out an employment assisting plan to subsidize graduates to have a work-term for a year. College graduates from 2007 to 2009 will have a monthly subsidy of $NT22,000 plus $NT4,190 to cover life, retirement and health insurances by the MOE. TKU can obtain altogether NT$229,000,000 from the MOE to offer 667 work-term opportunities. TKU has the largest amount of subsidy money from the MOE among all universities in Taiwan. TKU will hold Graduate Job Fairs by inviting enterprises and businesses to offer work-term opportunities to graduates from today to Feb. 28, 2010.

To face the challenges by the world-wide economic crises that have seriously affected the job market, with the help of the university, this plan is to encourage enterprises to provide graduates with intern opportunities, helping them search suitable potential future jobs through work-terms which will last until Sept. 30, 2010. So far 285 enterprises registered for the Fairs, including Chinese Television System, KPMG Taiwan, MiTAC Inc., Polaris Fund Management, Tatung Co., YFY Fine Paper & Board, Ho Tung Chemical Corp., LTD, etc.

TKU will set up a Work-Term Committee which will be chaired by President Flora C.I. Chang, and the Committee will work out a tripartite contract concerning TKU, the student intern, and the enterprise. It will also set up a Counseling and Reviewing Group, regularly visiting intern enterprises, examining student interns’ working situations. Alumni Service and Resources Development Director Wen-fa Sye said that during the work-term, student interns could apply their academic knowledge learned at TKU in their work, and they could also obtain work experiences to meet societal needs. The plan reserves at least 112 work-term opportunities for the 2009 graduating students. Hearing the news, graduating Mathematics senior Mei-fang Chen jumped with joy, saying, “If this is really true, the opportunity is so fascinating that I will go on the Internet to check about it, and I will certainly grasp it.” Educational Technology senior Chian-yu Hsu said that the plan will provide graduates with one more employment channel, but the opportunities are limited. She would work even harder and more diligently to develop her own ability to meet future challenges. Interested graduating students can download and fill in the necessary forms from http://www.fl.tku.edu.tw/practice/ and email the forms with other related references to the Office of Alumni Service and Resources Development. ( ~Dean X. Wang )