Record
Event Highlights
What can the final stretch before university graduation still be used for? The third edition of “Interdisciplinary Learning Meetup,” themed “Learning Begins When You Leave Campus,” invited Lien Sheng-hao from the Department of Dentistry at National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University and Lai Chu-yuan from the Bachelor Program of Innovation at National Taiwan University to share how they forged their own learning paths between institutional gaps and transnational fieldwork.
A University Life of Randomly Adding Skills to the Tree
When Lien Sheng-hao entered university in 108, his school was still Chiao Tung University. He later personally experienced the merger of Yang Ming and Chiao Tung, watching the campus transform from a single medical campus into a comprehensive university. Over his seven years at university, he moved between the Taipei and Hsinchu campuses, exploring fields including life sciences, information technology, and public participation, while also visiting institutions and facilities in remote areas of Yilan, Hualien, and Taitung to learn the operating principles of cutting-edge technologies. During the early stages of the merger, the administrative systems had yet to be integrated. When Lien applied for housing status and scholarship eligibility, even the staff in charge could not explain where the rules came from. He also took advantage of the opportunity created by the integration of resources at the two universities to cross-enroll: in addition to studying dentistry at Yang Ming, he took foundational courses in business and law at Chiao Tung, commuting between the two campuses by shuttle bus and often rushing into class just before the lunch-hour deadline. He described the period of staying up late studying with his peers and encouraging and competing with one another as the most inspiring part of his entire learning experience. After beginning off-campus clinical internships in his sixth year, he had effectively left campus life. He treated the limited free time remaining before graduation as his final opportunity to arrange his learning freely, choosing to continue his studies and explore other possibilities. As for whether he will eventually open a practice, he said he is still observing the situation and has not yet decided. Looking back, this path took quite a few detours, but it is precisely because of them that every step has left a deeper impression, becoming part of the one-of-a-kind person he is today.
Cross-Disciplinary Exploration through Music and Carnival: Before Celebration and Creativity
Lai Chu-yuan is a member of the second cohort of the Bachelor Program of Innovation at National Taiwan University. He studies learning in musical improvisation from a human-computer interaction perspective and is also a percussionist. He has fifteen years of experience in percussion and began exploring Latin and jazz music four years ago. He has long participated in two professional ensembles, “Taiwan Latin Percussion” and the “Taipei Samba Drum Team,” accumulating experience performing at major events including the Dadaocheng International Music Festival and Megaport Festival. Last year, he was accepted into NTU D-School’s exploration program. Together with Professors Tsai Wen-chieh and Ho Yu-chieh, he also submitted a paper to a computational creativity conference in Brazil, where it was selected. The two projects came together as an off-campus learning journey: first spending a month and a half in Brazil, followed by 21 days in Tokyo. Dissatisfied with being moved by melodies alone, he went in person to samba schools, favelas, and museums of Afro-Brazilian culture in Rio de Janeiro to gain a close understanding of the history and social context behind samba music. Rio Carnival is organized by community-based samba schools, and a single group can easily number more than 3,000 people. He also joined rehearsals and performances with a team at the Asakusa Samba Carnival, observing that what Japanese communities pass down is not only technique but also a spirit that values transmission and community. Under conditions of limited resources and a different cultural context, Asakusa has also developed a localized style that is “cute” and “playful.” After returning to Taiwan, he planned his next step: applying for a project lasting nearly a year that would take him to Montevideo, Uruguay, and Argentina for extended periods of fieldwork. He would continue researching carnival communities from a transnational perspective while connecting these off-campus learning experiences back to the long-term influence of the Innovation Program’s “Project by Project” approach to learning on his way of thinking and acting.
Conclusion
At the end of the event, the host asked a series of questions about time management, the uncertainty of dealing with systems that were still being revised, and whether the speakers felt satisfied with the choices they had made so far. Lien Sheng-hao admitted that he had not planned in detail, making trade-offs by intuition and quickly letting go of things that had already happened. Lai Chu-yuan said that he only set broad directions and candidly acknowledged that he “quite likes gambling,” willing to sacrifice small things in exchange for a higher probability of success and calmly accepting that he occasionally “bet too big.” Both felt that rather than becoming entangled in whether a system is mature, it is better to seize the things one genuinely cares about in daily life, continue investing in them, and let one’s awareness of problems gradually emerge.
Note: “Interdisciplinary Learning Meetup” is jointly organized by the Association for Innovation and Transdisciplinary Education (AITE) and the Office of the Ministry of Education’s “Pilot Program for Flexible Interdisciplinary Study.” It is expected to be held once a month, continuing to invite practitioners, researchers, and educators to exchange ideas and engage in dialogue.
