HEEACT President C. Y. Chen announced the launch of the Web-based interactive process, which took the council two years to develop.

Experts from Germany, France, the United States, Britain, Canada, and Spain, as well as Taiwanese academicians, contributed to the effort.

Chen said that the system uses a step by step process that allows users to pick schools using 11 criteria, 24 academic indicators and 16 general information data points.

The general information includes history, enrollment, number of programs and Web sites, student service, scholarships and tuition.

The criteria cover academic survey, student selectivity, student demographics, faculty, library acquisitions, research output, teaching quality, international outlook and graduation rate.

Indicators reflect enrollment rate, proportion of graduate students, graduation rate, proportion of faculty members above the position of assistant professors, proportion of professors with advanced degrees, proportion of full-time faculty, faculty-student ratio, total expenditure per student, number of articles published, National Science Foundation grants per faculty, proportion of international students, proportion of international faculty and library expenditure per student.

Chen pointed out that all data was collected through academic surveys, government databases, and directly from the 69 institutions.

Users can also select prospective schools by region, type, size and programs, according to Chen.

HEEACT was founded in 2005 under the initiative of the Ministry of Education (MOE). With an aim to conduct MOE commissioned higher education evaluation and accreditation, the council was formed with funding from all universities and colleges in Taiwan.

(By Lillian Lin)