National Taiwan University (NTU)

Widely considered as Taiwan’s most prestigious university, the National Taiwan University is now a research university highly respected across the world.

Its history stretches back to 1928 when the institution was founded as the Taihoku Imperial University by the Japanese colonial administration. It was later handed to the nationalist government of China in 1945 after it won the war of resistance against Japan, leading to its new name, National Taiwan University.

The university, known as NTU, now has 11 colleges, with 54 departments and 103 graduate institutes, four university-level research centres (population and gender studies, condensed matter sciences, biotechnology and biodiversity), with an overall student population of around 33,000, including 17,000 undergraduates and 15,000 graduate students.

It has five campuses in the Tapei area and two further afield, though its main campus is situated in the heart of Taipei.

Among its notable alumni include the Nobel laureate Yuan T. Lee, the first Taiwanese scientist to win the accolade when he picked up the award for chemistry in 2009, computer scientist Andrew Yao, a professor at Princeton, and the current president of Taiwan Tsai Ing-wen – one of four heads of state to attend NTU.

The university’s motto is ‘Integrity, Diligence, Fidelity, and Compassion’, which is adopted from a line in the speech made by President Ssu-Nien Fu in 1949 as he celebrated the fourth anniversary of the university.

The university also has its own official song, whose lyrics were drafted by Kang-Po Shen, dean of the College of Liberal Arts, in 1968, which were set to music by composer Yuen-Jen Chao.