The Chinese-language United Daily News recently reported that 34 vocational high schools were on the brink of closing because of a lack of students.
Because I served at a rural private high school for more than 30 years and rose to become principal, I found this news especially shocking. Although my school was not one of the 34 schools reportedly nearing collapse, I still felt a mixture of worry and anger at the news. I can only heave a deep sigh and think back on the many years of flawed education policies that have strangled the survival of private schools.
First, Taiwan's declining birth rate has been well documented, so why are new public vocational schools still being established across the country? The reason is that the Ministry of Education has long been manipulated by politicians. These politicians attempt to win elections by promising voters that new schools will be established.
Not only has this wasted public funds and plunged schools into competing with each other to attract students, but it also presents an unprecedented threat to the existence of private schools.
If we took the massive budget allocated to building and operating the new, useless schools and put it toward improving the staff and facilities at private schools in remote rural areas, it would be a better way for the ministry to improve the nation's level of education. And if subsidies were allotted to these schools to narrow the gap that exists between public and private schools, as well as between urban and rural schools, then the ministry's 12-year program of improving the nation's education system would not be hard to achieve.
By connecting communities and vocational high schools, the ministry would deliver a fatal blow to the pressures that squeeze out private schools.
Just as new universities have sprouted up over the past decade, technical colleges have multiplied as well. Five-year junior colleges have rushed to upgrade themselves into technical colleges or technical universities. Now, in addition to targeting middle school graduates for enrolment, these junior colleges have also been trying to gobble up high school graduates.
As a result, "community" schools that originally had just 2,000 to 3,000 students have grown into "institutions of higher learning" with 10,000 students.
This growth has lowered educational quality to the point of crisis. As the number of students pursuing higher education has increased, two-year junior colleges -- which are normally attended by high school graduates -- can't attract enough students.
To remedy this situation, the ministry's Department of Technological and Vocational Education has come up with yet another stupid idea: beginning next year, technical schools that agree with its plan and change from two-year junior colleges to five-year junior colleges will be allowed to offer popular classes in areas such as food and beauty.
These technical schools will be competing for extremely scarce resources with vocational high schools. This is certain to crush the private vocational high schools, which are already on their last legs.
Within 10 years, the shrinking birth rate will also have an impact on the technical schools, which will then have to face an even fiercer fight for survival than the vocational high schools face now.
Rural private schools and the agricultural sector have both made enormous contributions to Taiwan's educational and economic development. Forty to 50 years ago, many private vocational high schools were established in poor, remote areas simply to make it easier for rural children to get an education. This program worked and worked well.
Now, however, the ministry's new policies are squeezing the life out of private schools. I cannot help but see that this has come about because of the collusion between politicians, government and business.
Every time I have participated in an education ministry conference over the past several years, I always hear ignorant and incompetent bureaucrats talking about "setting an exit strategy," "respecting market mechanisms" and "establishing special characteristics," among other political blather.
These concepts are presented without a trace of self-reflection or acceptance of responsibility. Sometimes I have almost been unable to restrain myself from shouting out that I'm sick of listening to such nonsense.
If politicians and the government's policies continue to poison the environment for private schools, we will be forced to take to the streets in protest and I will take a position at the head of the pack to lead the charge.
Twu Shuenn-jenn is the principal of Pingtung Meiho Senior High School.
Translated by Marc Langer
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