Abstract The cultivation of native faculty was an important approach to the independent and initiative developments of the new higher education institutions in the modern China during its transplantation of the western cultures. In the very beginning, the development of the government-sponsored faculty studying abroad program in the Republic of China was motivated by the need of the higher education institutions to learn advanced international knowledge effectively from the USA and Europe, to maintain faculty's international academic level and to inspire native faculty's endeavor into research. Afterwards, this system was under the influence of the efforts by the China Foundation for the Promotion of Education and Culture, which aimed to cultivate China’s local science and technology leading talents, and the influence of the governmental promotion, which proposed to elevate higher-education quality and foster senior experts. Due to the fact that the faculty studying abroad exhibited more advantages and benefits than the general students studying abroad in the advanced academic fields, this system of supporting the high education institutions faculty to study overseas continued to develop, and it grew to complement the system of sponsoring others to study abroad. Under the promotion of government, universities and CFPEC, the way of sending faculty abroad with public funds gradually became diverse and layered, and elitism was enhanced with an aim to further project-oriented disciplinary developments, which resulted in that the system of sponsoring the high education institutions faculty to study abroad eventually differentiated from the general students studying abroad program in terms of sponsorship strength and means. The prominent characteristics of the government-sponsored faculty studying abroad system in the Republic of China was further strengthened and hence elevated the faculty's academic level in higher education.
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