北美洲台灣人教授協會年會特刊 2006
作者 NATPA
Welcome to NATPA 2006 Annual Conference
A message from President Edward Huang
Dear Members:
Welcome to the beautiful Northern California to attend the 26th Annual Conference.
All of you probably have been witnessing the recent political turmoil caused by Pan-blue group in Taiwan. They have been continuing to undermine the government of Chen Shui-bian since 2004. On June 27, they attempted to fire President Chen in the Legislative Yuan, and their proposition as you all know was defeated. Nevertheless, these incidents caused unrest and great disturbance to the entire society of Taiwan. NATPA, on June 26 and 27, has joined other 36 Taiwanese organizations in the US to purchase a half page advertisement in Liberty Times in Taiwan. The main message of the advertisement (shown next page) is to reveal the true intention of the Pan-blue group and to remind the Taiwan residents to support their own democratic nation of Taiwan. While our attention has been drawn to the current political turmoil, there are other imminent issues in Taiwan which also require attention.
When the hurricane Katrina hit the US gulf coast areas last fall, it caused significant damages to oil refineries and several offshore oil production platforms. This resulted in a sharp rise in the gasoline price that impacted our daily life and driving behavior. There is another imminent factor affecting our life, which may not be as obvious. As China and India continue to improve their economic activities, their thirst for the oil has been fast increasing. China has now emerged as a strong oil importer competing with the US for this natural resource on the international market. When the super-powers are competing for such limited natural resource, one should worry how a small country like Taiwan is going to secure her share of oil supply. The other problem we need to ponder is the education. For Taiwan to be able to survive and remain competitive in the current and future international market of high-tech and bio-tech, Taiwan needs a good educational system to produce students of high caliber.
For these reasons, we have chosen the theme of the 26th Annual Conference to be “Bridging American Experiences with Taiwan’s Challenges”. Under this theme, we have invited Taiwanese experts both from the US and Taiwan together in Northern California to discuss and exchange ideas on how and what to do to help Taiwan overcome problems related to energy and education. On Saturday (July 28), Prof. Ruey J. Sung, the Vice President of National Cheng- Kung University, will talk about his vision of a first rate university. This will be followed by a full day discussion of Taiwan energy. The subject of education will follow on Sunday morning. We plan to hold panel discussion at the end of each subject and will welcome questions from the audience. We plan after the conference to issue conference proceeding (in a CD form) for later distribution.
We also have arranged two experts to address the topics of interest to senior persons, as the average age of the NATPA members is advancing. Prof. M.T. Tsuang will talk about “Promoting physical, mental and spiritual health”, and Dr. Steve Lin will talk about ’’Total joint replacement”. The evening of Saturday will be a music program presented by our vocal performing artist Helen Lee. She will present a special music program combining her rendition
of the familiar tunes from worldwide with her interpretation of the relation between vocal music and languages, and enhanced by beautiful photography. It should bring you the enchantment of the mixture of audio and visual arts.
The Young Scholars Program, initiated in 2004, provides travel funds to support Taiwanese and Taiwanese American graduate students and young scholars to participate in the NATPA Annual Conference. This year, twelve talented students from all over the States were selected. I would like to thank Dr. Ping Wen Hou, who carried out a very successful fund raising campaign in year 2005. The Program of this year still benefits from this fund.
We are also very grateful to our members, Dr. Chris Yung-tsai Yen, Professor Emil T. Lin and all other who have made donations to the NATPA general fund. For those members who have not yet paid the annual membership due or are too busy to write a check for donation, it is still not too late to fill the forms at the end of this program and mail the forms with the checks to us.
Our post-conference tours of this year will be unique and different from what have been done in the past. We will spend more time at one well-known tourist spot, the Carmel-Pt. Lobos area.
On day one of the tour, we will guide the participants to walk through the back alleys of the nice city of Carmel to visit many hidden gardens and small courtyards. On day two of the tour, we will hike the trails of Pt. Lobos and allow more time to enjoy and take pictures of the beautiful ocean scenery. At the same time, this would allow our friends to have more time to know each other. We think all the participants will enjoy this experience.
Finally, I would like to thank members of the program committee, the conference committee, and all those who did not hesitate to contribute their time to ensure the success of the Conference. I also like to thank our ex-President, Henry Wang, who has constantly given me valuable advices, and our Vice President, Shitien Yang, who is always there to support me 100 %. On behalf of NATPA, I would like to express my deep gratitude to all of these people.
Print in 2006/07
Posted in 2015/12
