Making a mockery of education

`While Ma Ying-jeou's behavior was appalling, Frank Hsieh's was also contentious. Although some of [Minister of Education] Tu's actions are controversial, does Hsieh think Tu's conduct is completely shameful? Did he and Ma think that hundreds of educational officials have been twiddling their thumbs for the past few years?'

In the second televised presidential debate, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential hopeful Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) and his Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) rival Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) finally mentioned educational issues. However, their performance was a big disappointment because one was frivolous and shallow, while the other dodgy and superficial.

Ma read off his script as he accused the administration of providing nothing but slogans for educational policies, and asked what Hsieh thought about Minister of Education Tu Cheng-sheng (杜正勝).

Ma mentioned educational policies drafted by the central government such as the "provisional guidelines for the senior high school curriculum," which was implemented in the 2006 academic year, "general guidelines for senior high school curriculum," which will be carried out in the next school year, the "grades 1 to 9 curriculum" and the "12-year compulsory education." For a presidential candidate to call these policies mere slogans is an insult to the hundreds of personnel involved in their drafting and implementation.

The Ministry of Education was empowered to establish high school curriculum guidelines, and the "provisional guidelines for the senior high school curriculum" were set up to prepare students from the first to the ninth grade in the transition to high school.

Whether the guidelines are better than the high school curriculum standard implemented in 1995 is a question better left to the evaluation of academics. A curriculum can never be perfect and needs to be amended over time. Many people have contributed their time and effort to improving these guidelines. Although I'm still not satisfied with the results, I will not totally repudiate them either.

Besides, the "grades 1-9 curriculum" was launched in 1997 and ratified in 1998 under then minister of education Lin Ching-jiang (林清江), who announced the first stage of the provisional curricular guidelines before he left his post in 2000.

Ma's disdain for the people who worked on those revisions was an insult to all the officials, teachers and experts who were involved.

As for the 12-year compulsory education, former KMT chairman Lien Chan (連戰) included it in his election platform when he ran for the presidency in 2000 and promised that he would carry it out within three years.

The DPP administration has helped carry out the policy of an unsuccessful candidate: Shouldn't Lien take pride in this?

In my opinion, the start of the 12-year compulsory education should be implemented between 2011 and 2012. Before then, narrowing the difference between school tuition fees or improving the quality of regular and vocational high schools is a necessary step. Can we frivolously term these efforts mere slogans?

While Ma's behavior was appalling, Hsieh's was also contentious. Although some of Tu's actions are controversial, does Hsieh think Tu's conduct is completely shameful? Did both he and Ma think that hundreds of educational officials have been twiddling their thumbs for the past few years?

The establishment of digital opportunity centers, improvement of teachers' classroom skills, control over supply and demand of teachers, upgrading vocational high schools and adoption of a composition component in the basic competence proficiency test for junior high school students are all part of the achievements of Tu and many government officials.

Hsieh could have openly talked about Tu's merits and demerits, instead of avoiding the subject. In doing so, he showed his tacit acceptance of Ma's accusations.

What made it hard for Hsieh to speak out is pressure from a public that has been misled by the media's oversimplification of vital issues. The public should be more concerned with those so-called educational reformists who disregard the law.

For example, doesn't the media know that the law stipulates that each school has the right to select its own textbooks based on the regulations approved by its school board? But with their administrative power, some local governments have tried to force whole counties or cities to use one uniform textbook.

Moreover, although the ministry has regulated the maximum number of class hours in its curriculum guidelines, a number of local governments have chosen to increase class hours. Quite a few county and city governments have included English classes in the first grade curriculum to please voters despite the lack of teaching resources, increasing the pressure on first-grade students.

Many county and city governments have also evaded regulations and diverted educational funds. To top it all off, a large number of these county commissioners and city mayors had served as legislators and even reviewed some of these educational policies.

Wu Chung-tai is president of the National Teachers' Association.

Translated by Ted Yang