Parents and teachers associations yesterday accused the Ministry of Education (MOE) of reneging on its promise to provide tuition subsidies for all students enrolled in public and private high schools, vocational high schools and junior colleges.
The Cabinet yesterday approved a plan that would provide subsidies to students of families whose average annual income does not exceed NT$900,000 (US$27,700), starting this fall semester.
Last week, the ministry presented a draft proposal offering subsidies to families whose annual income does not exceed NT$600,000 this fall and raising that threshold to NT$900,000 for the next schoolyear.
According to the ministry, 69.1 percent, or 336,115, students would still qualify under the approved plan, which would cost the state about NT$3.1 billion a year.
National Teachers Association president Liu Chin-hsu (劉欽旭) said that Minister of Education Wu Ching-chi (吳清基) and his deputy, Lin Tsung-min (林聰明), had both pledged in March that all students entering private high school, vocational high school and junior college in the coming school year would enjoy a tuition break.
Liu said that private schools had taken that verbal promise as an incentive to attract more students over the past three months, and more than 10,000 junior high school graduates had already chosen their schools for the coming academic year.
However, with the change in plan, Liu said he wondered how parents of students who do not qualify for the subsidy would be able to afford tuition at the more expensive secondary schools.
National Alliance of Parents Organization chairman Hsieh Kuo-ching (謝國清) said he had received a phone call from a parent with two children studying in private high schools, who said he was considering divorcing his wife so his family could meet the household income threshold.
Wu said the government had always meant to exclude wealthy families from the tuition break.
“We’ve never changed our stance. If [the ministry] caused a misunderstanding [about the tuition policy], I take full responsibility for it because it was my own wishful thinking,” Wu said.
Wu said he thought the tuition break would apply to all secondary school students regardless of their economic status, but he later found it impossible to make the plan work with a budget of only NT$1.2 billion (US$36.9 million).
Wu said the ministry would compile a list of potential students affected by the policy change, but he also urged private schools to set up scholarships to help them.
Tsai Chih-ming (蔡志明), a specialist at the ministry's Central Region Office, which supervises high schools and vocational high schools in the nation, said junior high school graduates who had already selected their schools for this coming academic year had until tomorrow to change their school applications.
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