June 15, 2006
Nova, Japan's biggest language school, is setting up its first overseas branch in Taiwan. In addition to regular classes, the school plans to bring its Ochanoma Ryugaku Video Conferencing teaching system to Taiwan.
Formed in 1981, Nova is Japan's largest language school and holds a 53.9% market share in Japan. In addition to English and Japanese, Nova also provides instruction in conversational French, German, Spanish, and Italian.
Nova Chairman Yuan Qiao-wang said on May 17 that Nova's teaching format will be similar to Taiwan's own Global Village language school chain, which will be Nova's main competition. Nova will open its main branches in the greater Taipei area and hopes to expand to between 10 to 20 schools.
Taiwan's current language school market is mostly composed of English instruction for children – however, the adult language market has grown in recent years with the growing demand for language skills in the Taiwan job market, and the rising prominence of the government-sponsored General English Proficiency Test. Taipei currently has the largest concentration of language schools.
Nova's first school in Taiwan will be its Zhongshan Branch in Taipei's Nanjing West Road shopping area. At the beginning, Nova will only provide one-on-one English instruction and add Japanese classes on July 7. As for other languages, students will be able to use school facilities to hold classes with teachers at Nova headquarters through a special distance class offered by the school called Ochanoma Ryugaku, which uses video conferencing technology to allow students to study with a teacher from home.
Nova hopes to offer the Ochanoma Ryugaku classes in Taiwan within three years.
(Economic Daily News)
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