Policy
Mandarin Education 2025 Program
Schedule
January1, 2022 - December 31, 2025
Goals
- Provide comprehensive coordination & promotion mechanisms
- Refine proficiency descriptors & assessment
- Enhance access to Mandarin education in North America and Europe
- Provide comprehensive Mandarin teacher training support systems
- Integrate & develop digital Mandarin teaching & learning
- Establish more Mandarin learning centers overseas
Implementation Strategies
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Provide comprehensive coordination & promotion mechanisms
The Ministry of Education (MOE) commissions bodies and agencies to coordinate and oversee Mandarin Education Project related matters, including promotion of Mandarin learning, Links with Phase 2 of the Higher Education SPROUT Project will provide access to an even more extensive range of Mandarin education resources. -
Refine proficiency descriptors & assessment
The MOE commissioned NAER to formulate Reference Guidelines for Using the Taiwan Benchmarks for the Chinese Language, and SC-TOP to revise the TOCFL Test of Chinese as a Foreign Language proficiency tests. TOCFL 2.0, released in early 2023, incorporates more CAT testing and the level descriptors align with those of other international proficiency tests. -
Enhance access to Mandarin education in North America and Europe
The MOE is encouraging universities in Taiwan to collaborate with universities in Europe and in North America to implement the Taiwan Huayu BEST Program. Subsidies are available for university language centers in Taiwan to develop improved learning software and hardware to attract more overseas students to study Mandarin in Taiwan. -
Provide comprehensive Mandarin teacher training support systems
The MOE has developed Competency Indicators for International Mandarin Teachers that can be used to evaluate training mechanisms of key aspects of Mandarin teacher training, including academic education, assessment, and practical training. This is designed to assist the training of high-quality accredited teachers of Chinese as a Foreign Language. -
Integrate & develop digital Mandarin teaching & learning
A central platform is being built to provide one-stop access to the Mandarin education resources of the Taiwan Mandarin Educational Resources Center, Huayuworld, and COOL Chinese websites. Subsidies are available for universities in Taiwan to develop innovative online Mandarin courses to cater to learners worldwide through the internet. -
Establish more Mandarin learning centers overseas
Make MOE subsidies available to set up Mandarin learning centers in universities in Europe and North America under the Taiwan Huayu BEST Program, to provide a variety of activities, such as professional development courses and workshops for Mandarin teachers and TOCFL proficiency testing. As well as serving Mandarin learners and educators, the centers will serve as bases for Taiwan to promote Mandarin education at universities in Europe and North America.
Eight-year Chinese Language Education Promotion Plan (2013–2020)
Ministry of Education

In response to the global demand for Chinese language education, Taiwan’s Chinese language education sector has been vigorously looking outward and internationalizing and marketing itself, and this led to planning and implementing the Eight-year Chinese Language Education Promotion Plan (2013–2020). This eight-year plan is now well underway.
Goals
- Strengthen the organizational network and build a base for sustainable development of Chinese language education
The Ministry of Education set up the International Chinese Language Education Advisory Committee in August 2011, and the Interdepartmental Chinese Language Education Development Support Task Force under this advisory committee was set up in March 2014 to help organize Chinese language education planning and promotion. The Taiwan Mandarin Educational Resources Center was established, in 2016, to work together and in coordination with Chinese language education institution units undertaking evaluation, building language databases, and cloud language education.
- Improve the quality of Chinese language education and promote specialization and differentiation
Take a total quality management (TQM) approach to Taiwan’s Chinese language education to ensure and highlight its high quality and competitiveness. This includes evaluating Chinese language education institutions and providing advice to help them upgrade the quality of their operations, and develop areas of specialization to feature.
- Promote international exchanges on overseas Chinese language education and increase the number of Chinese learners
Fully integrate and compile an inventory of Chinese language education resources to provide more resource support for this sector, and integrate the resources of government agencies in Taiwan to boost development of this sector and the selection of overseas markets to target.
- Develop the higher education industry and set up a complete Chinese language education network
Adopt a holistic approach and link the marketing of Taiwan’s higher education with the business sector. When foreign students come to study in Taiwan they spur and expand the benefits to the local tourism industry. Two related projects include the Promotion of Chinese Language Education Cooperation with Industry and Performance Management, and the Development of Cloud Education, each addressing different aspects.
- Establish mechanisms for cooperation between the government, academic, industry, and research sectors and set up a complete Chinese language cooperation network
Open up overseas markets by promoting the supply chain concept, providing incentives to set up government-academia-industry task forces, and integrating overseas resource channels in ways that are fully aligned with international practices.
Implementation Strategy and Key Work Focus
The Eight-Year Plan was progressively revised a number of times in 2016 and six new key focus points were added:
- Systems and environments
- Institutions and organizations
- Training of skilled professionals
- Educational resources
- R&D and international cooperation
- A holistic cross-sector approach, incorporating the higher education, life services, and tourism industry sectors.
The Eight-Year Plan is positioned as part of the higher education sector. Its development strategy and key work focus are outlined below.
- Development Strategy
- Establish implementation and oversight mechanisms.
- Strengthen the Chinese language education institutions’ facilities and operations.
- Train skilled professional Chinese language education personnel.
- Research and develop Chinese language education resources and set up related databases.
- Encourage international research on Chinese language education.
- Set overseas promotion targets and create a strong market presence.
- Key Work Focus
- Create training bases for Chinese language teachers.
- Enhance the capacity of Chinese language education institutions.
- Open up new overseas markets for Chinese language education.
- Promote the TOCFL Chinese language proficiency tests.
- Set up a Chinese language corpus and standards system.
- Develop hands-on and digital Chinese language education materials.
- Promote learning Chinese in Taiwan.