To actively meets the needs of overseas academic community, and improve the talent gap of humanities and social science research in Taiwan, MOST has promoted the Taiwanese Overseas Pioneers Grants (TOP Grants) since 2018. TOP Grants has entered its third year by the Science & Technology Policy Research and Information Center (STPI) of National Applied Research Laboratories.

Today (6th January), the press conference will be held for the announcement of the results, inviting overseas scholars who have been cultivated to share their thoughts on their academic research. MOST announced that the schedule for the new phase of the grant solicitation will start in late April 2021. The doctoral candidates and young scholars in the humanities and social sciences who meet the application requirements are welcome to apply.

The purpose of the grants is to encourage talents of Taiwan in the field of humanities and social sciences, and to help them focus on the writing of academic books and dissertations to enhance the quality of academic research so that they can achieve certain status or position at foreign universities or academic institutions. As such, it should help strengthen and consolidate the status of our humanities and social sciences of our country in the field of international academic research.

In order to cultivate outstanding research talents of our country in humanities and social science overseas, this grant has aimed at two types of research and new blood with great academic potential: the first category is of those talents who are PhD candidates at the last stage of their studies in overseas of Taiwan; of the second category, they are talents who obtain doctoral degree for less than 10 years, and they are working at research institutions in overseas of Taiwan as full-time teachers or researchers. With financial assistance, it should help them focus on the writing of academic books and dissertations, consolidating their firm foundation on international academic and research community.

Of those talents to be cultivated, they will be selected by the "Academic Review Committee," which is made up of scholars with academic prestige, academic achievement, and impartiality from the field of humanities and social sciences based on theoretical value and innovation of the candidate's research theme, extent of rigor with the application content, feasibility of the research plan, academic potential or research experience of the applicant, and academic achievements and other criteria of selection.