The 921 Earthquake and Wan Nian Hall

The 921 earthquake in 1999, the worst ever attacking Taiwan in the last two centuries, brought about a severe damage to the old Language Center. Official investigations confirmed that the damage was irreparable. A reconstruction was then recommended by an evaluating committee appointed by the University. The reconstruction, which includes works such as planning, financing, contracting, designing, and equipment purchasing, took more than 4 years to accomplish. The budget of the reconstruction was approximately 110 million NT dollars. Executive Yuan's "Post-921 Reconstruction Commission" subsidized 8.4 million of the budget. The NCHU's Academic Affairs Fund financed 51.6 million. The remaining 50 million was footed by the outstanding alumnus, Mr. Wan Nian Lin. The old Language Center is a 2-floor building of 19,368 square feet. A comparatively larger one, the new Center is composed of five stories and a basement, the area of which totals 88,848 square feet. Indebted to the generous donation of Mr. Lin, the new building was named after him and called "Wan Nian Hall," which means "a build that will last for 10 thousand years" in Chinese.

Equipment and Facilities

The Language Center currently has 8 professional language drill labs, a simultaneous oral interpretation lab, a TOEFL iBT site, 3 multi-media classrooms, a software library (also a self-learning room for students), 3 conference rooms, different in size. The language drill labs possess full compatibility with instructors?interactive teaching methods. Each language drill lab is installed with a LCD projector, an Internet-accessible computer, a DVD-ROM, a VCR, a teaching material prompter, and wireless microphones. This multimedia space enables teachers to make use of materials derived from both analog and digital platforms. Most important of all, this environment empowers teachers to use technology to facilitate and enhance students?creativity and their desire to become lifelong language learners.

The Software Library provides students a self-learning environment. Its voluminous collection of teaching materials is also available for teachers to use. Currently, the hardware equipment of the library includes 16 TV sets, 6 VCRs, 10 DVD-ROMs, 3 tape recorders, and 4 computers.
The title collection includes:

Pictures: The Classrooms and the Self-Learning Center

Future Development

For the time being, the Language Center has classrooms for miscellaneous professional usage. In addition to supporting the academic requirement of foreign language teaching on campus, the Language Center will maintain and also develop the following services:

1. The Center takes charge of various language capacity examinations, aiming to become the representative language training and test center in central Taiwan. For decades, the Center has been entrusted by LTTC to hold TOEFL in central Taiwan. Since 2000, the NCHU Language Center has been administering GEPT’s speaking comprehension test in Taichung on behalf of LTTC.
2. The Center’s Extensive Education Section cooperates with the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures in providing the public with various foreign language courses. The Center also plans to cooperate with enterprises to open miscellaneous foreign language classes to help advance their workers?foreign language abilities and strengthen their competence in international competition.
3. The Center’s simultaneous oral interpretation lab is set up to train professional translators and interpreters, who have been enjoying a high demand from international conferences and businesses.