Control Yuan members, in a recently published report, called for improvements in the care and education of Aboriginal children as they highlighted the inaccessibility and high cost of such services for Aborigines.
There is an urgent need to coordinate efforts among the Ministry of Education, the Council of Indigenous Peoples and local governments to address the difficulties that urban Aborigines face in enrolling their children into public child-care centers that provide affordable and attentive care and quality education, the report concluded.
Data provided by the Ministry of Education showed that most children between two and six years old in Aboriginal families living in urban areas are unable to enter public child-care centers, the report said.
As of March this year, only 23 percent of Aboriginal children in urban areas were enrolled in public child-care centers, while 38 percent were in private institutions, far less than the percentage of pre-school children taken care of by public child-care institutions in the UK and China, the report said.
In view of the increasing migration of Aboriginal families to urban areas that lack tribal networks, nursery education for Aborigines has become a critical issue, it said.
Control Yuan members Chou Yang-shan (周陽山) and Shen Mei-chen (沈美真), who initiated the probe into the issue, urged government agencies to follow the policy stipulated in Article 10 of the Education Act for Indigenous Peoples (原住民族教育法) to ensure Aboriginal children have access to education.
Government agencies are required by the act to provide Aboriginal children with public child-care services, to ensure that they take precedence when enrolling in public child-care centers and to offer tuition subsidies to Aboriginal families, they said.
The Control Yuan members also called for reforms to the education offered to Aboriginal children after they visited Bethel, a care center for Aboriginal children funded by the non-profit Zhi-Shan Foundation that is located in Wugu District (五股), New Taipei City (新北市), the main base of the nation’s urban Aborigines.
Established more than 10 years ago by Malayumu, a Rukai Aborigine from Pingtung County, Bethel takes care of about 100 Aboriginal children per day at no cost or a very low cost of NT$4,000 a month, one-sixth the price of a similar service provided by private institutions.
Bethel, open 24 hours a day, has not been able to get a license as a child-care center because of non-compliance with statutory licensing requirements. However, it respects Aboriginal traditions and customs and teaches several different mother tongues, the report said.
Citing a landmark US Supreme Court ruling in 1972 that gives the Amish people, who teach their children in one-room schools and do not usually educate their children past the eighth grade, as a rare exemption from the US’ compulsory education laws, the Control Yuan members urged the government to respect Aborigines’ cultural values in its education policy.
NATIONAL SECURITY: Authorities are working to confirm the identities of the military personnel involved and investigating possible illegal conduct and regulatory violations Authorities are probing possible national security implications after Kinmen police and immigration officers on Sunday found a Chinese woman allegedly posing as a tourist while engaging in prostitution involving more than 10 military personnel. The woman, surnamed Chen (陳), has since been deported, authorities said, adding that investigators are still working to confirm the identities of those implicated, as the records only listed code names and aliases. The case stemmed from a report received by the Kinmen District Prosecutors’ Office on Friday last week from the Jinhu Precinct of the Kinmen County Police Bureau. On Sunday, police, along with the National Immigration
GLOBALGIVING: ‘ Caving to external pressure is not acceptable for an organization that has cultivated justice reform and human rights for 30 years,’ one NGO said A slew of non-government organizations (NGOs) have withdrawn from the GlobalGiving fundraising platform after it announced it would use “Chinese Taipei” instead of “Taiwan” from next month. The Taiwan Good Rice Association wrote on Facebook on Friday that it was informed on April 28 via a teleconference call of the change, which was made because the platform wanted to operate in China. Taiwan Good Rice is to terminate all cooperative relationships with GlobalGiving in response to the platform’s “unilateral and non-negotiable” decision to remove references to Taiwan, the NGO said. “Taiwan is in the official name of Taiwan Good Rice Association and the
HEAVY WEATHER: Typhoon Jangmi is due to crash straight into the Ryukyus as airlines look to shift flights to larger aircraft or cancel flights to Okinawa entirely Taiwan’s international air carriers announced flight adjustments over the weekend as Typhoon Jangmi is forecast to hit the Ryukyu Islands today and tomorrow. The Central Weather Administration (CWA) upgraded Jangmi from a tropical storm to a typhoon at 8am yesterday, with the eye located 580km south of Naha city. It was moving north at 19kph. Today, China Airlines’ CI-120, CI-121, CI-122 and CI-123 flights between Taoyuan and Naha, Okinawa, have been canceled as well as CI-132 and CI-133 between Kaohsiung and Naha. EVA Air’s BR-112, BR-113, BR-186 and BR-185 flights between Taoyuan and Naha are also canceled. Low-cost carrier Tigerair Taiwan canceled IT-230,
STAY COOL: The HPA recommended that people stay hydrated, use air-conditioning or fans while indoors, wear loose-fitting clothes and walk in the shade while outdoors Employers must implement measures such as installing cooling equipment, and providing drinking water and rest breaks for outdoor workers starting from Monday next week, the Taipei Department of Labor said on Sunday. Employers who fail to comply could face fines of NT$30,000 to NT$300,000 under the Occupational Safety and Health Act (職業安全衛生法), the department said. Businesses in Taipei employing fewer than 100 workers, as well as registered self-employed workers with labor insurance coverage, could receive on-site assessments and guidance from occupational safety consultants to help them apply for central government subsidies to implement or improve heat-protection measures, it said. Under the Ministry of
RSS