In 2012, NPUST began taking part in the Universitas Indonesia(UI) UI GreenMetric World University Ranking and by 2014 it began a six year winning streak, coming first in Taiwan every following year. As part of its commitment to the Green University project, in 2019, NPUST President Chang-Hsien Tai and Office of International Affairs Dean Pomin Li made arrangments to travel in person to Ireland to take part in the 5th International Workshop on UI GreenMetric World University Rankings (IWGM).
As everyone is well aware, Covid -19 has resulted in many countries closing their borders and restricting travel this year, which has put a huge damper on international exchange activities. GreenMetric, however, has responded by hosting three online conferences, getting representatives from the GreenMetric member universities in the same place to discuss the issues that are important to them.
The first webinar conference was held on April 21 under the theme of “Shaping Global Higher Education and Research in Sustainability”. NPUST’s President Chang-Hsien Tai, General Affairs Chief Chin-Lung Chang, OIA Dean Pomin Li and International College Dean J.C. Leong participated in the conference together with representatives from seven other universities including Brazil’s Universidade de São Paulo, Italy’s Universita di Bologna, the University College Cork. In addition to discussing the future development of higer education and the potential models of cooperation between Green University member countires, the university executives exchanged information about the epidemic prevention practices that their respective countries were adopting.
On May 9th the second conference, “Webinar Series 1” was held with the aim of discssing global food supplies. Representatives of around 100 GreenMetric Universities from around the world in attendance with eight members were invited to provide 10 minute reports on the theme of “Sustainable Universities and Food Sustainability during the Covid-19 Pandemic”. NPUST OIA Vice-Dean Herlin Chien and Chief of New Southbound Project Office, Pearl Pei-Chun Chang represented NPUST at the conference, with Vice-Dean Chien reporting on NPUST’s epidemic prevention and food policy. In addition to introducing the measures that the univesity is taking toward epidemic prevention, Vice-Dean Chien explained how the Department of Animal Science, Department of Plant Industry and Department of Hotel and Restaurant Management were using their resouces to provide food to teachers and students –and reducing their need to risk going out to shop. The name of her report was “From Crisis to Opportunity: Linking the Need for Local Food Sufficiency with University Social Responsibility to Build a Resilient Society”. The paper will be published in the GreenMetric this August. The third conference, “Webinar Series 2”, extended was held on June 9th on the topic of “Teaching, Learning and Working in Sustainable University during COVID19 Pandemic”. During the session, representatives from member universities in Indonesia, Turkey, Equador, Chile, Latvia, Saudi Arabia, Mexico and Denmark were called to give reports. OIA Vice-Dean Herlin Chien once again represented the university a for the webinar, which had over 100 members in attendance for a time of very engaged discussions. During the talks, represntatives of many schools expressed that they faced many challenges with the virtual classroom arrangments, including implementation, upholding of course quality, and prevention of student cheating.
