Good afternoon,

Prof. Dr. Wichit Srisa-an, President of the Thai Association for Cooperative Education, Thailand

Prof. Dr. Krasae Chanawongse, the Former Minister of Foreign Affairs, Thailand

President Shi-Shuenn Chen, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology

Honored guests from Thailand, university presidents and representatives from Taiwan.

“Taiwan-Thailand Education Forum” aims to encourage the exchange of more opinions and experiences on the development of higher and technology education, enable participants to reach a consensus for future action plans. After one and half days of discussion, I believe this forum has been successful based on the following facts.

First of all, Taiwan-Thailand educational cooperation has been reached to a great consensus in a number of approaches.  Such as scholarship program (which is Elite Study in Taiwan project), there would be 600 instructors from Thailand universities pursuing Ph.D. degree in Taiwan during next 5 years. Those relative working procedures have been ready for both sides. Furthermore, the internship programs should be further extended between Taiwan-Thailand universities and corporations. The existing limitation would be reviewed and de-regulated.

During the Forum, our discussions and interactions have strengthened and moved us forward, especially, in the aspects of university-industry cooperation, collaboration research, joint degree programs, and staff/student exchange. The officials from Taiwan and Thailand attending the round table meeting both agree to interact even more closely in the future to achieve concrete results in all these areas of consensus.  Meanwhile, the 3^rd Taiwan-Thailand Higher Education Forum will be held by Sripatom University, Bangkok, Thailand, in March 2013.

I would like to express my gratitude to President Shi-Shuenn Chen, of the National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, his dedicated faculty and staff, whose tireless efforts have contributed greatly to the success of this forum.

 Finally, on behalf of the Ministry of Education, I would like to thank everyone for you participation in this Forum, and I hope that the coming campus and site visits will provide you with a better understanding of Taiwan’s educational efforts. Thank you!