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MOE censured in report

"An imbalance in the ratio of students to professors has occurred in colleges and the quality of education has worsened."

Chao Jung-yao, Control Yuan investigator

Although it's been 10 years since educational reform was implemented, a correction order issued by the Control Yuan yesterday found that the quality of Taiwan's higher education had reverted to the level of 15 years ago.

The Control Yuan's education committee yesterday announced an investigation report to correct the Ministry of Education (MOE) for the deteriorating quality of higher education over the past decade, pointing out that educational resources available to each university student had reverted to the level of 15 years ago as the budgets for higher education recorded a negative growth since 1994.

"The MOE failed to increase the budget for higher education in line with the rapid growth of college students, which led to a situation in which educational resources were seriously watered down," Control Yuan investigator Chao Jung-yao (趙榮耀) said yesterday. "An imbalance in the ratio of students to professors has occurred in colleges and the quality of education has worsened," Chao said.

According to statistics cited by Chao, in 1993 about 690,000 students were enrolled in 125 universities and colleges, and that by 2003, the number of universities and colleges had increased to 167, with the number of students expanding 84 percent.

Meanwhile, the ratio of students to professors was 14 to 1 in 1993, with the figure rising to 20 to 1 in 2003.

The higher ratio directly impacted students' educational rights, Chao said.

Each student was allotted only about NT$160,000 of educational resources in 2001, which was the level of 1989. The allotment peaked in 1996, with each student having NT$210,000 to use.

"It is a worrying situation that students have fewer educational resources to use even though they passed the college entrance examination," Chao said.

Additionally, Chao said, the number of people with bachelors degrees has increased by 192 percent, the number of people graduating with masters degrees has increased 333 percent and people with doctoral degrees rose by 180 percent over the past 10 years.

Although the Ministry of Education has proposed a "bow out mechanism" to phase out those schools that are less competitive and encourage schools to merge, the formula for the mechanism is not clear and the result has been poor so far, Choa said.

Chao added that the MOE had also failed to revise related education laws and conduct reforms in the administrative system, which should be corrected by the Control Yuan.

Meanwhile, the Executive Yuan also faced a correction order from the Control Yuan for a rise in the adult illiteracy rate.

Three percent of all people over the age of 15 in Taiwan are illiterate, according to another investigation report announced by the Control Yuan yesterday.

The report said that governments at all levels have not paid enough attention to the issue. As well, they have not allocated enough resources for lifelong learning with the result that around 548,000, or 3 percent, of those over 15 were illiterate in 2003, lagging far behind the 2 percent rate seen in industrialized countries.

Outlying islands and agricultural counties have the highest illiteracy rates. The rate in Lienchiang is 7.75 percent and Kinmen sits at 7.4 percent. In agricultural areas such as Yunlin County it is 6.6 percent, both Changhua and Chiayi are at 6.12 percent, and Kaohsiung County has a 4.55 percent illiteracy rate.

For this reason, the Control Yuan censured the Executive Yuan for gross negligence.
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