Tamkang University (TKU) will continue conducting the evaluation of teaching units this semester. A total of 18 graduate institutes and departments under Colleges of Science, Engineering and Technology, and General Education and Core Curriculum Division of the Educational Development Center will take part in the evaluation, which will comprise two stages--a self-evaluation and an evaluation by experts.

The report of the self-evaluation would be completed by March 3, 2003. School authorities will invite experts to conduct the second-stage evaluation. The formal report would be completed in May.

Those participants have already set up a self-evaluation committee and an expert evaluation committee on Feb. 21, 2003, respectively. Those colleges participating in the evaluation have submitted a list of four to six candidates of experts to TKU President, who will choose three out of them. The self-evaluation will begin this week.

The evaluation of teaching units will be held every three years in principle. The unit with excellent evaluation will be recommended to TKU President for awarding. The school authorities will continue to track and screen the unit with unsatisfactory evaluation.

The evaluation will include teaching, research, service, administration, guidance and counsel, and future prospects. The contents of the self-evaluation will include the explanation of the advantage of the institute or department, what’s left to improve, and the progress which the institute or department holds. And the evaluation done by experts is the same as far as the above-mentioned contents go, except for an extra, the comments of self-evaluation and orientation.

In order to encourage the university to conduct the self-evaluation, the Ministry of Education (MOE) earmarked NT$20 million to subsidize 40 universities and colleges around Taiwan last year. TKU and Yuan Ze University have obtained the highest subsidies of NT$800,000 for the past two consecutive years, indicating that the MOE confirmed the good performance of TKU and Yuan Ze.

The Division of Educational Quality Management, Educational Development Center said that the College of Science was the first teaching unit in TKU to conduct the evaluation of teaching in 1999. Three departments under Colleges of Engineering, Business and Foreign Languages and Literature took part in the evaluation in 2000. Twenty-two departments and institutes under Colleges of Liberal Arts, Management, International Studies, and Education joined the project in 2001. The College of Technology and the Division of General Education and Core Curriculum will be part of the evaluation in this academic year for the first time.