“Facing the Challenges of the 21st century: Competition or Collaboration?” This is the key question that educators in Taiwan are currently faced with. It is also the theme of a recent lecture delivered at TKU’s Tamsui Campus by world renowned scholar, Jamil Salmi.

Prof. Salmi is a Moroccan education economist and the former tertiary education coordinator of the World Bank, specializing in polices of global tertiary education, finance, governance, college world ranking, and benchmark learning. He is also the author of numerous seminal textbooks exploring the administrative systems of the world’s foremost universities.

The lecture investigated three main topics, including “the importance of knowledge”, “requirements and methods for reforming the education system”, and “the meaning of the new economy: competition or collaboration?” Prof Salmi believes that higher learning should be oriented toward helping students develop their ability to innovate. To do so, universities could apply method such as: promoting invention and the spirit of experimentation; shedding the limitation inherent in old ways of thinking; seizing opportunities; breaking the existing educational norms and mores; and finding happiness from one’s mistakes.

After the lecture, a Q&A session was held, in which Prof. Salmi responded to questions posed by TKU faculty and staff. The session was hosted jointly by Prof. Salmi, along with the President of TKU, Dr. Flora Chia-I Chang, and the Dean of the College of Education, Dr. Hsun-Fang Kao. Responding to a question about globalization, Prof. Salmi explained that educational globalization is no longer about the number of incoming and outgoing exchange students at a particular university. Rather, the new indicators of globalization refer to the extent to which a university can apply the positive aspects of globalization, such as designing courses that meet students’ practical needs and providing students with opportunities to work in any of a number of countries after graduating.