A Heartfelt Thank You To Purdue University and United States

A Heartfelt Thank You To Purdue University and United States

Opening speech by NCKU President Michael M. C. Lai at the inauguration of the Purdue- NCKU exhibition on January 19, 2009, commemorating a decade of collaboration from 1952-
1963

Purdue representatives, Purdue Alumni, representatives from the American Institute in Taiwan, colleagues, and distinguished guests, welcome to the highly anticipated opening ceremony of the Purdue-NCKU Special Exhibition. We are joined today by many esteemed guests and I would like to give a special welcome to our Purdue friends who came thousands of miles from West Lafayette, to celebrate this special occasion with us. This event is filled with extraordinary significance from the 20th century and will hopefully have a deep implication in the 21st century.

Today’s event is much more than a museum opening. It is a historical occasion that honors and underscores a past event and renews a friendship that started more than a half century ago. We are here today to pay homage to the pioneers of NCKU, to remember the ones who paved the way for NCKU in becoming one of the leading universities in Taiwan today. We want to express our heartfelt thank you to Purdue University who has played such a pivotal role for NCKU to reach what it is today. This exhibit reminds us all of what two universities can achieve with dedication and passion for education.

The Purdue-NCKU Project, which began in 1952 and completed in 1962, was part of the U.S.-Aid Program that brought a remarkable amount of educational assistance to universities in the Asia Pacific region. During this era, NCKU was called Taiwan Provincial College of Engineering and it was with the financial assistance of this Program that it was expanded to Taiwan Provincial Cheng Kung University in 1956. The U.S.-Aid Program not only invested approximately 3 million USD into NCKU over the next ten years, which in today’s dollars is probably well over many tens of millions of dollars, but also provided new buildings and research laboratories, introduced new teaching methods and courses, and modernized the entire campus. The most significant of its efforts were the Purdue professors that were sent here to advise the administration of the departments and collaborate with our faculty. Among the many professors sent here, it was Professor R. Norris Shreve that led the Purdue-NCKU Project to achieve the profound and fundamental educational reform that resulted here.
Professor Shreve continued Purdue’s efforts at NCKU years even after the U.S.-Aid Program ceased its financial support. Among all the education assistance the U.S.-Aid Program provided in Asia Pacific, it was the Purdue-Formosa Project that was hailed as the most systematic and successful case of “engineering education reform”.

Ladies and gentlemen, as you know, during this period, the Asia Pacific region was suffering from an intellectual standstill and regressing into a third-world mentality.
But the U.S.-Aid Program, in effect, gave the Asia-Pacific region a new life and returned self-confidence back to Asians. In the decades since, NCKU has produced a myriad of alumni who have gone on to significantly influence Taiwan’s economy and industries. These outstanding individuals not only reinvent Taiwan but Asia and the world in general. In every sector of business and academia, you will find CEO’s, President’s, managers, leaders; all can claim NCKU as their alma mater. Nearly everyone here today has been affected in some manner by the Project. We are living proof of the perpetual success of the U.S.-Aid program.

NCKU has endured a long journey to become an outstanding comprehensive research intensive university today. However, we did not get here purely on our own. It was the combined efforts and selfless assistances of so many people throughout the years and the world, such as those from Purdue University, that have given us a shining place in the international academic community. And today, we finally give an official recognition of appreciation to one of the most important contributors in NCKU history, Purdue University.

At this moment, we are writing a new chapter in NCKU history. I look forward to a new era of friendship and academic collaborations.

Thank you to the NCKU Museum for all the hard work they put into preparing this historical event and a special thank you to NCKU’s Senior Executive Vice President, Dr. Da Hsuan Feng, who could not be present today, for being a catalyst in this project.

Ladies and gentlemen, with Director Castro from AIT, Kaohsiung, present here today, I would like to represent NCKU, and if I may be so bold, represent my Asia Pacific colleagues as well, in extending a heartfelt thank you to the United States.
Throughout the 20th Century, assistance from the United States Government and NGO’s to Asia Pacific was profound and palpable. This included the creation of private and public universities, scholarships for the brightest of the bright and sustained assistance to fledgling universities, as seen in Purdue’s efforts in the 50’s.
Indeed, Asia Pacific would not be what it is today were it not because of this colossal and sustained effort by the United States. I know that United States was given full credit for rebuilding Europe after World War II, known as the well-crafted “ Marshall plan.” The United States assistance to Asia Pacific, however, received little or no credit, because it was not a well-defined project. If I may say, I think what the United States did in Asia Pacific in the 20th century is in effect a “super Marshall-like plan.” So while our celebration today is minute compared to what happened throughout the 20th century, it nevertheless is an extremely remarkable one.

Finally, Mr. Castro, tomorrow is a big day for the United States where President-Elect Barack Obama will be inaugurated to be the 44th President of your country. Throughout his campaign, President Obama made it clear that “restoring the reputation of the United States” will be one of his administration’s highest priorities. I hope the history of what the United States had done in the 20th century, in assisting Asia Pacific in building its intellectual infrastructure, will be part of his building block of restoration.

Thank you so much for your attendance and attention.