National Pingtung University of Science and Technology (NPUST) yesterday offered an apology after some of its students left graffiti at one of the nation’s major natural scenic attractions.
“We are very sorry [for the students’ misconduct]. We will oblige them to do volunteer community service after school begins [later this month],” said Liu Ine-wei (劉英偉), secretary-general of the school.
The school was forced to offer the apology after four students from the school’s Department of Soil and Water Conservation were found to have scribbled on the pillars of a public pavilion during a visit to the Jhihben (知本) National Forest Recreation Area in Taitung County on Dec. 13.
CORRECTION FLUID
The students wrote their names, the name of their department, the initials of the school and the date of their visit in correction fluid on the pillars.
The school subsequently received a number of complaints from angry visitors to the area, prompting authorities to take action.
“Their adviser demanded that the four students call the East Coast National Scenic Area Administration and apologize,” said Wu Chia-chun (吳嘉俊), chairman of the student’s department.
FORGIVE
Despite the students’ misconduct, the school administration had decided to forgive them and said that administration staffers would remove the graffiti, Wu said.
The NPUST students were not the only ones who have recently left their mark at a national scenic area.
Earlier last month, several students from Tunghai University’s Department of Industrial Engineering were disciplined by the school for scribbling on a plaque at Wuling (武嶺) on the New Central Cross-Island Highway (新中橫公路) — about 3,275m above sea level.
CRITICISM
The incident drew widespread criticism of the students on the Professional Technology Temple (PTT) — one of the biggest college bulletin board systems in the nation.
The Tunghai students were required to return to Wuling and clean up the graffiti they had left.
Taiwanese were praised for their composure after a video filmed by Taiwanese tourists capturing the moment a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Japan’s Aomori Prefecture went viral on social media. The video shows a hotel room shaking violently amid Monday’s quake, with objects falling to the ground. Two Taiwanese began filming with their mobile phones, while two others held the sides of a TV to prevent it from falling. When the shaking stopped, the pair calmly took down the TV and laid it flat on a tatami mat, the video shows. The video also captured the group talking about the safety of their companions bathing
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
A classified Pentagon-produced, multiyear assessment — the Overmatch brief — highlighted unreported Chinese capabilities to destroy US military assets and identified US supply chain choke points, painting a disturbing picture of waning US military might, a New York Times editorial published on Monday said. US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s comments in November last year that “we lose every time” in Pentagon-conducted war games pitting the US against China further highlighted the uncertainty about the US’ capability to intervene in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. “It shows the Pentagon’s overreliance on expensive, vulnerable weapons as adversaries field cheap, technologically
RSS