National Chung Hsing University (simplified Chinese: 国立中兴大学; traditional Chinese: 國立中興大學) is a university in Taichung, Republic of China (Taiwan). According to Ministry of Education rankings, it is the best university in central Taiwan. The university has undergone a number of significant stages of change. It began as the Advanced Academy of Agronomy and Forestry, founded by the Japanese in Taipei in 1919. After 1928, the Academy became a special department affiliated to Taihoku Imperial University (now National Taiwan University). But the department became an independent school again in 1943, and was moved to Taichung. After the Kuomintang took over Taiwan in 1945, the school was reorganized and renamed Taiwan Provincial Taichung Agricultural Junior College. In 1946, the Junior College evolved into a higher institution, Taiwan Provincial College of Agriculture. Then in 1961, it combined with the newly-established College of Science and Engineering on the same Taichung campus and the College of Law and Business founded in Taipei in 1949, to become Taiwan Provincial Chung Hsing University. In 1964, an Evening School was set up on the Taipei Campus.