Participants in the “Explore Taiwan” virtual seminar held on October 30, 2021

The Ottawa Catholic School Board (OCSB,) is a publicly funded school board in the city of Ottawa, Canada’s capital. It has 84 schools—at primary, junior high school, and senior secondary level—under its jurisdiction, with a total student population of more than 44,200. 

Its senior secondary schools are the only ones in the Ottawa region that offer students the opportunity to take Mandarin as a credit subject, using and teaching the traditional character script for reading and writing. This credit subject can be taken by Grade 9 to 12 students, under the OCSB’s International Languages Secondary Mandarin Program.

Many of the students who take this subject are interested in opportunities to study and work in Taiwan, so the Education Division of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Canada organized an “Explore Taiwan” seminar for these senior secondary school students.
The pandemic is still affecting the region, so the seminar was held virtually on October 30, 2021. The TECO personnel gave a comprehensive outline of Taiwan, and then focused on different opportunities for studying and working there. This included giving details of the Ministry of Education scholarships available, TEEP – the Taiwan Experience Education Program, TOCFL – the Test of Chinese as a Foreign Language, online Chinese learning resources, and opportunities to Teach English in Taiwan.

The seminar went for more than an hour and it was followed by a Q&A session. Most of the students wanted to know more about exchange programs and opportunities to work in Taiwan, and some of the parents who also attended asked a number of questions related to studying in Taiwan.

Ten students attended the seminar, together with several parents. A few students were unable to attend that day, and a few students who wanted to take part tried to but encountered technical issues that prevented them accessing this very informative seminar.