From Jan. 31st to Feb 7th, a delegation from the Tamkang Department of Public Administration made a goodwill visit to four major universities in Northeast China. The delegation consisted of 14 faculty members and students from the Department of Public Administration, including the department Chair, Dr. Irving Huang. The Group visited Jilin, Heilongjiang, Liaoning, and Northeastern University, each of which received the visitors with warm hospitality.

Dr. Irving Huang noted that “through our visit we aim to develop even closer relations with universities in Northeast China”. Their mutual relationship is already quite close. For example, in the coming months, Jilin and Liaoning Universities will each send representatives to visit Tamkang University and discuss broadening the scope of current exchange agreements. TKU is also set to begin conducting joint research with Liaoning University on government control systems and will soon jointly establish a full-time center for research.

Northeastern University, on the other hand, hopes to increase the frequency of faculty exchange and has invited TKU faculty to deliver guest lectures at NEU later this year. Dr. Huang added: “During this recent trip, we not only visited one of our sister universities (Jilin University), but also made contact with several non-sister universities, whom we hope will attend the symposium held by our department in May this year”.

One of the participating Tamkang students, who serves as a confidential secretary at the Tamsui District Office, said that “during this trip, I observed that senior faculty members at Mainland Chinese universities have very clear objectives, both in a theoretical and practical context. Their attitude is something we can all learn from”.