Kuei Shan History
Taipei Kuei Shan School (Kuei Shan), fully accredited by the Taipei City Government Department of Education in the Republic of China, was established in August 1963 as a small private K-9 school and intended to be an experiment in Taiwanese Education. Founder Professor Hsiong Hui-Ying hypothesized that the large class sizes of her time (around 50 students per class) were the root cause of many educational issues including ineffective learning and misbehavior, and utilized Kuei Shan to investigate the relationship between reduced class size and strengths-based child and youth development.
“The experiment design could be better. The test time could be longer. Although there are many shortcomings, with strong desire and much effort, I’ve conducted a revolution-like attempt to the traditional teaching methods….”
– Hsiong Hui-ying, 1963
Upon the success of this long-term research, the school continued its commitment to the following educational experiments:
Biblically-integrated education
Effective classroom management strategies and instructional methods
Chinese classical-literature based Chinese language arts curriculum
Integration of abstract knowledge and practical application
Connecting with nature
Balanced lifestyle
Culturally appropriate character education
Dual-language Immersion Program
Beginning the fall semester of 2002, a Chinese-English dual-language immersion program was launched starting with the 1st and 2nd grades. Keeping with the Kuei Shan tradition of experiential learning coupled with optimizing student learning, the new program aimed not only to provide an exceptional English literacy curriculum but to build upon the principles that had served Kuei Shan so well throughout its long history.
International Baccalaureate (IB) Programs
Taipei Kuei Shan School is recognized as an International Baccalaureate (IB) World School to offer the Diploma Program as of March 1, 2015, the Middle Years Program as of April 25, 2016, and the Primary Years Program as of May 1, 2015. For further information about the IB and its programs, visit http://www.ibo.org.
Digital artifact showing the transfer of campus land in 1974.
Kuei Shan operated without external benefactors and relied only on tuition, and this transfer is remembered as God's miraculous provision for Kuei Shan as it made the costly operation of a private and experimental school possible.