In a bid to tackle the problem of a lack of sleep among high-school students, the Ministry of Education yesterday promulgated rules that grant students the freedom to skip morning school activities arranged before their first class, pushing the time students are required to arrive at school back to 8:10am.
The announcement was made in response to discussion sparked by an online petition launched by Thomas Chen in late September on a National Development Council platform to encourage public participation in policymaking.
The petition, titled “High-school students in Taiwan are not getting enough sleep and should be allowed to go to school later,” garnered 6,542 online signatures.
The rules, which are to take effect in September next year, stipulate that students would be allowed to arrive at school at 8:10am at least twice a week, rather than having to arrive at school before 8am for morning activities.
High schools should ask students to arrange pre-class activities to help their studies on at least two days every week, the rules say. High schools should not schedule more than two morning assemblies every week, according to the rules.
“The rules will help students develop a healthy mind and body, and ensure that they have the energy to learn,” K-12 Education Administration division head Yang Kuo-lung (楊國隆) said. “Students are expected to attend morning conventions, which are a school-wide activity, but if they are absent it should not be reflected on their attendance record.”
“The ministry encourages high schools to provide counseling to students who fail to attend morning conventions rather than punishing them,” Yang said.
Similarly, students would be allowed to choose whether to attend morning study sessions and no punishments should be handed down should they choose to opt out, he said.
“The number of days on which pre-class activities are held at a school should be decided by a democratic procedure and the administration should respect the decision,” he said.
Responding to media queries over whether the rules are also to be implemented at junior high schools, given that some junior-high students are punished for being late, Yang said that junior high schools are supervised by local governments, but the ministry would advise local education authorities to adopt the same rules.
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