The Ministry of Education’s policy to reduce the number of military instructors nationwide remains unchanged, Minister of Education Cheng Jei-cheng (鄭瑞城) said yesterday, while the justice minister admitted to accidentally telling universities to hire government ethics personnel.
During a question-and-answer session of the legislature’s Education and Culture Committee, Cheng said the ministry decided at an administrative meeting on Oct. 23 not to fill vacancies for military instructors at universities for the next three years.
Cheng said statistics showed there were about 1,388 military instructors on university campuses and that this figure would drop by about 100 each year.
There will be around 690 military instructors left at colleges in three years time, he said.
But he said the ministry would not cut the number of military instructors at high schools because they play a role in student safety.
The ministry has sought to reduce the number of military instructors at universities since the term of former education minister Tu Cheng-sheng (杜正勝), who considered their presence on campuses inappropriate.
The presence of military instructors at high schools and universities dates back to the 1950s, when they were responsible for students’ military training, discipline and political education.
They are now generally tasked with ensuring campus safety. Those at high schools are also responsible for student discipline, counseling and military training courses.
Cheng acknowledge the instructors’ role in campus safety, but said that some of their duties, such as counseling, should be taken over by professionals trained for those tasks.
When asked for comment, National Taiwan University president Lee Si-chen (李嗣涔), who also attended yesterday’s meeting, said that military instructors played an important role in campus security, but that they should not remain a part of university faculty in the long run.
But Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) and Kuo Su-chun (郭素春) disagreed.
They urged the ministry not to “force military instructors out” simply to follow the ideology of the former Democratic Progressive Party government.
In related news, Minister of Justice Wang Ching-feng (王清峰) said no ethics personnel would be assigned to campuses or government offices.
“It was a misunderstanding. I assure you that such a thing will not happen,” Wang told the legislature’s Judiciary and Organic Laws and Statutes Committee.
The issue was highlighted when the Ethics Affairs Department issued notices to schools suggesting that all schools and government offices assign ethics personnel. The proposal was criticized as a return to the Martial Law era, when ethics staff were used to collect information for the government.
Wang said it was a misunderstanding, adding that she had “signed the document by mistake.”
Wang said the ministry wanted to assign people as campus contacts to provide information about government policies and help schools with legalities concerning their financial declarations.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY JIMMY CHUANG
Taiwanese scientists have engineered plants that can capture about 50 percent more carbon dioxide and produce more than twice as many seeds as unmodified plants, a breakthrough they hope could one day help mitigate global warming and grow more food staples such as rice. If applied to major food crops, the new system could cut carbon emissions and raise yields “without additional equipment or labor costs,” Academia Sinica researcher and lead author the study Lu Kuan-jen (呂冠箴) said. Academia Sinica president James Liao (廖俊智) said that as humans emit 9.6 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide compared with the 220 billion tonnes absorbed
The Taipei Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) Wanda-Zhonghe Line is 81.7 percent complete, with public opening targeted for the end of 2027, New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) said today. Surrounding roads are to be open to the public by the end of next year, Hou said during an inspection of construction progress. The 9.5km line, featuring nine underground stations and one depot, is expected to connect Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall Station to Chukuang Station in New Taipei City’s Jhonghe District (中和). All 18 tunnels for the line are complete, while the main structures of the stations and depot are mostly finished, he
Taipei is to implement widespread road closures around Taipei 101 on Friday to make way for large crowds during the Double Ten National Day celebration, the Taipei Department of Transportation said. A four-minute fireworks display is to be launched from the skyscraper, along with a performance by 500 drones flying in formation above the nearby Nanshan A21 site, starting at 10pm. Vehicle restrictions would occur in phases, they said. From 5pm to 9pm, inner lanes of Songshou Road between Taipei City Hall and Taipei 101 are to be closed, with only the outer lanes remaining open. Between 9pm and 9:40pm, the section is
China’s plan to deploy a new hypersonic ballistic missile at a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) base near Taiwan likely targets US airbases and ships in the western Pacific, but it would also present new threats to Taiwan, defense experts said. The New York Times — citing a US Department of Defense report from last year on China’s military power — on Monday reported in an article titled “The missiles threatening Taiwan” that China has stockpiled 3,500 missiles, 1.5 times more than four years earlier. Although it is unclear how many of those missiles were targeting Taiwan, the newspaper reported
RSS