Project Details
A. Complementing the Higher Education SPROUT Project with NPUST’s
Development Themes & Objectives for Joint Promotion
Ever since NPUST was founded, its most important objective has been to develop research capabilities relating to tropical agriculture as well as to cultivate talents, aiming to become a top international, comprehensive university of agriculture and technology. NPUST has grown to become home to seven colleges now, including the College of Agriculture, the College of Engineering, the College of Management, the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, the International College, the College of Veterinary Medicine, and the College of Professional Studies. Thanks to the injection of resources enabled by the Higher Education SPROUT Project, all of these colleges have been able to develop their own fields and interdisciplinary programs, allowing students to familiarize themselves with industry-relevant skills while they are still at school. This alignment with industry requirements has augmented their job market competitiveness.
NPUST positions itself as a teaching/research university; in terms of education, its goals are to cultivate talents who are: (1) professional: equipped with professional skills; (2) internationally-oriented: equipped with international perspectives and the ability to operate in a multinational environment; (3) humanity-oriented: equipped with interdisciplinary and humanistic literacy, creativity and social concerns. The feature development objectives of NPUST’s development focus on four main development themes: The technology-based agriculture, ecological industry, platinum society, and sustainable economy fields, with plans to align with the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), as shown in figure 1.
Figure 1: NPUST’s four main themes and features span a range of disciplines while integrating various departments and institutes; in addition, NPUST’s four main development themes echo the spirit of SDGs.
Twelve major objectives of the Phase-2 Higher Education SPROUT Project have been planned based on the following: various benchmarks derived from implementing the Phase-1 Higher Education SPROUT Project between 2018 and 2022, results of the NPUST’s implementation of various programs, analyses on the NPUST’s research topics, adoption of the principles and spirit of SDGs, feedback from the implementation results of the SPROUT Project, the University’s mid- and long-term plans, and features consistent with a comprehensive university of agriculture and technology. These objectives are:
B. Plans for the Phase-2 Higher Education SPROUT Project
Aspects | 12 Major Objectives |
|---|---|
Teaching innovation and refinement | 1. Develop an innovative teaching environment that integrates an orientation towards literacy, in order to boost and develop students’ self-learning capabilities |
2. Enhance smart and digital teaching, in order to develop students’ skills relating to information technology and humanistic care. | |
3. Cultivate interdisciplinary STEM talents and integrate professional expertise to develop students’ problem-solving capabilities | |
4. Build up students’ international mobility and enhance their capacity for communication, multiculturalism, and international adaptability | |
5. Leverage the NPUST’s expertise to advance sustainable development and social participation, and strengthen values associated with sustainability and social responsibilities | |
Fulfill social responsibilities | 6. Local cooperation, adopt a problem-oriented approach based on actual conditions, innovate and create new teaching methods, and provide systematic learning guidance to students |
7. Integrate resources to assist local development, stimulate the growth of local communication networks, and facilitate sustainable development | |
8. Extend the benefits of social responsibility efforts based on concrete actions and broaden students’ horizons by encouraging wider international engagement | |
Industry-academia collaboration and connection | 9. Strengthen students’ innovative and entrepreneurial competencies, and encourage them to develop their problem-solving capabilities through learning by doing |
10. Enhance feature research and expand the NPUST’s R&D capacity | |
Promote publicness in higher education | 11. Assist disadvantaged students to help them turn their lives around |
12. Build a campus that’s friendly to indigenous peoples and increase understanding of the importance of respecting them |
Aspect 1: Teaching innovation and refinement
NPUST seeks to promote faculty members’ professional growth through systematic projects, such as series of lectures for innovative teaching, competency seminars, and industry-academia collaboration programs. It also recruits and employs new teachers to enable the passing of the baton from one generation to the next, boosting faculty members’ capabilities. Furthermore, NPUST aims to improve students’ professional and practical capabilities through diverse teaching methods, including interdisciplinary programs, innovative courses, off-campus internship programs, and industry visits. Course activities aimed at improving Chinese and English proficiencies and special classes for obtaining professional licenses are also set up to help students with their future employment.
Aspect 2: Fulfill social responsibilities
Push for closer ties between NPUST and local communities, with faculty members and students working together to help drive local development and prosperity. From professional courses to on-site practices, align with the UN’s 17 Sustainable SDGs, and cultivate sustainable development literacy and social care among faculty members, students, and staff. Further liaise with public associations and corporations to connect corporate social responsibility (CSR) with university social responsibility (USR), bringing international alumni and sister schools together to bring about implementation on an international level, promote local development, broaden students’ international horizons, and facilitate the cultivation of international talent as well as industry-academia connections internationally.
Aspect 3: Industry-academia collaboration and connection
Integrate the Office for Innovation & Entrepreneurship, Innovation Incubation Center and related resources inside and outside the campus to start innovation and entrepreneurship classes while developing systematic courses. The goal is to instill into students innovative and sustainable thinking, so they can realize their entrepreneurial aspirations by participating in innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship competitions, and setting up shops at incubation spaces and trade exhibitions. NPUST also plans to encourage faculty members to organize interdisciplinary research teams and lead students to conduct cross college/department/institute cooperation and research. They are also encouraged to step outside the campus to work with corporations or even overseas schools or international corporations, in order to cultivate high-level R&D talent.
Aspect 4: Promote publicness in higher education
In order to take care of economically or culturally disadvantaged students or indigenous students, NPUST provides reserved admission quotas, subsidizes accommodation and transportation when they take the entrance exam, and provides shuttle transport. After they are admitted, support grants for learning are also provided, as students participating in the “Worry-free Learning Support Program” are encouraged to build a habit of reading or self-learning. Disadvantaged students who demonstrate excellent grades or improvements are further subsidized. In the meantime, NPUST also reaches out to students via its advanced warning mechanism for grades from time to time.
C. Project Evaluation & Refinement
Performance assessment is conducted each year based on the six major evaluation mechanisms (Figure 2), as refinements and adjustments are proposed. NPUST hopes to become a top international, comprehensive university of agriculture and technology to cultivate talented students who transcend the four major boundaries. It also hopes to live up to the vision of becoming a top, century-old university in Asia that promotes sustainable development and social change.
Figure 2: Diagram demonstrating how the six major evaluation mechanisms are executed under the Higher Education SPROUT Project