Introduction

The National Youth Commission (NYC) was established on January 28, 1966, organizing the activities and handling guidance for the youths nationwide. The organizational statue was officially carried out in May 1982 in order to coordinate with national economic development as well as to cultivate young people's professional skills. “The First Youth Vocational Training Center” was therefore formed in 1970 becoming the NYC's subsidiary institution and its name was changed into “Youth Vocational Training Center” in 1986. The NYC has been through 19 ministers since its establishment. The incumbent minister, Miss Yi-Chen Chen, inaugurated on Feb 6, 2012 to become the 20th minister of the Commission.

According to current organizational structure, NYC's major businesses have been allocated into four major departments. The first department is in charge of youth entrepreneurial guidance and entrepreneurial belief education. The second department is responsible for youth career guidance and employment service. The third department is for the youth public issue engagement and deliberative democracy. The fourth department takes responsibility for arranging youth volunteering and studying through travel.

Therefore, NYC's major policies are to build up a platform for youths' overall development, to encourage them a spirit of innovation, learning, participation and service, and to create novel situations for new generations' creativity, diversity and courage to explore and to take responsibility. The policies involve several aspects as follows.

A. To build up a superb environment for starting enterprises in order to encourage youths and women to bring new entrepreneurs' spirit into full play

To encourage youths to bring diverse creativity into full play and to fulfill their entrepreneurial dreams confidently , NYC will continue strengthening business start-up loans for young entrepreneurs and subsequent youth entrepreneurial guidance network services . To improve entrepreneurial capacity of youths in Taiwan , it is meant to provide more convenient channels for business start-up loans for young entrepreneurs, to advance youth entrepreneurship education, and to make unused (buildings?) public properties useful for organizing an entrepreneur plan competition. In addition, NYC will also keep on implementing the “Flying Goose Program” to strengthen entrepreneurs consulting guidance and subsequent care services. Constructing a friendly entrepreneurship environment for women is also one of the important policies of NYC.

B. To enhance youth core employment capacity in order to strengthen the service interface for connecting with employment for youth.

To help young people to be employed smoothly and to narrow down the gap between academic campuses and workplaces, NYC will hold President Ma's policy of “the plan of connecting employment for youths” to carry out diverse and positive career guidance and employment advancement measures such as implementing the plan of youths' experience of workplaces, enhancing the trial plan for college graduates' employment capacity, the employment development plan of college students and various work-school services and internships. Then it is hoped to positively fulfill what former Premier Liou has expressed in the report of the goal of implementing policies: “shortening the gap between young people's learning and employment and helping them successfully connect with the workplace.”

C. To expand young people's public engagement in order to fulfill deliberative democracy and enhance their role and contribution in society

To lead youths' public issue engagement with the public, NYC has coordinated with President Ma's policy to complete the scheduled “Trilogy of Grand Alliance of Youth Policies.” The first is “Regional Youth Policy Forum” which takes place in different regions including north, middle, south and east of Taiwan . The second is “Youth Teamwork Policy Research and Development Competition” in which teams composed of Taiwanese youths aged 18-35 competing in ideas for creative policies and in action projects. The winners would win a prize of NT$50,000 and to be invited to “One Day experience as Head of the Department.” The arrangement is made in order to encourage the youths to focus on proposals of public policies to fulfill spirit of deliberative democracy and also to bring young people's intelligence and innovation into full play.

D. To establish “Youth Volunteer Service for Regional Peace” in order to construct new structure and new platform of youth volunteering

To encourage young people to pay more attention to the international affairs and domestic development and to increase the willingness of receiving services-learning training, NYC currently coordinates President Ma's policies to positively install the “Youth Volunteer Service for Regional Peace.” It is hoped to call for Taiwanese Young people's volunteering services at home and abroad, including supporting the poor and the weak, sustainable development, etc. In addition, NYC will also continue carrying out series of activities for Global Youth Service Day (GYSD) to encourage youths to propose creative and concrete service projects. It is hoped that young people would experience volunteers' spirit from service action and further profoundly realize the value of voluntary service.

E. To encourage young people to understand native culture, travel over all Taiwan, and encourage the trend of youth going on ‘grand tour'
The idea of youth grand tour lies in encouraging young people the spirit of traveling around – carrying luggage, leaving classroom, city, comfortable life and walking around every corner of Taiwan, and using a new and different angle to appreciate Taiwan. To coordinate with President Ma's “Plan of Youth Grand Tour,” NYC will schedule the excellent routes of youth grand tour and design superb maps by including the concept of “travel with responsibility.” A friendly environment for youth grand tour will be constructed so that Taiwanese young people can, from experience of the grand tour, find out self-positioning and further create a novel look of the young generations' innovation, vigour and courage to explore everything.