Hi,

I used to live in TW and had the same questions as you have. I was looking for PhD program in history and was looking specifically at NTU or NTNU. Neither have programs that are in English and, working full time, wanting to go to school only part-time, needed a flexible program. The TW unis are very much modeled on the American style PhD program in that regard... that you have to take quite a bit of coursework. So... I moved to HK and am now studying at HKU, part-time, and working full-time. The HKU, and other HK unis, are modeled on the British system, which is much more research based, and requires a lot less coursework. All courses are in English, mostly by Brits, Aussies, or N. Americans, at least all courses in my dept seem to be.

Regarding cost, HKU is relatively inexpensive at only 3,500 USD a year for a part-time student, finishing in four years. For full-timers it's a bit more, although not much, BUT I think that most of these full-time students get studentships of not less than about 19,000 USD a year. Now that's for my dept, and from what I'm familiar with, which is limited specifically to the history dept.

Another plus is that although they expect you to learn the second language, you have time to learn it while you are working on the PhD. Overall a nice program... except I literally HATE the fact that I have to listen to Cantonese every day on the street. It is such an ugly language, particularly compared to Mandarin, which is really beautiful to listen to.

Good luck!

Kris