Fri, May 31, 2002 page12

• A-ming, don't build your school

  • By Ouyang Chiao-fuei 歐陽嶠輝
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  Despite being NT$60 million short of his financial goal, Lee Chin-ming (李錦銘), better known as A-ming (阿銘), reportedly plans to go ahead with plans to set up his own university. A-ming never completed primary school but made NT$400 million selling beef noodles in Tainan and is determined to establish a university.

  As someone who hails from the area where the school is to be built and as someone who has worked in education, I would like to ask A-ming to please reconsider this matter. It's not too late for him to change his mind.

  It has been popular in Taiwan in recent years to found universities and colleges. In central and southern Taiwan, most of these schools commonly lease land from Taiwan Sugar Corp (Taisugar, 台糖). This land was formerly used as sugar cane fields and so the schools built on them are often referred to as "sugarcane universities."

  The college that A-ming has planned and raised money for is located in Liuying township (柳營鄉), in a sugarcane field adjacent to a north-south railroad line and mango orchards. As the proposed site is located a fair distance from both the Hsinying (新營) and Liuying train stations, it's not a good location for a school. Local industry's potential for development is limited. Due to insufficient capital, the construction of A-ming's proposed school has been postponed.

  There are already more than 150 universities in Taiwan. Some private universities are in the midst of expanding, racing to beat each other to the top, struggling to create a lasting foundation before they run into trouble. The number of students is increasing and the schools continue to expand, regardless of whether the nation actually needs the new departments and the students they educate. National universities are also expanding, in keeping with the policy of one national university per city and county. Taking advantage of this, colleges are expanding in order to become universities.

  But the situation for newly established schools appears to be different. No matter how much idealism they may generate, room for development tends to be tightly constricted. According to estimates given by the Cabinet-level Council for Economic Planning and Development, the number of elementary school students will decrease by 40 percent in the next 50 years, while the junior and senior high school student population will fall by 37 percent. The number of 18-to 21-year-olds will plummet by 50 percent.

  Given these trends, existing universities -- already too many in number -- will experience increasing hardship. For those small schools out in the countryside, which lack the benefit of a stable foundation, the situation will likely be even worse.

  Twenty years ago, when Japan's economy was still developing, many universities were established in that nation's countryside. Now, more than 500 of these schools are struggling to recruit students. Even attempts to recruit and retain students from China have been unsuccessful. This should serve as a warning to Taiwan.

  Beginning in 1988, I served as an adviser to the Ministry of Education in the field of construction, during which time I frequently participated in investigations of schools that were either being established or expanded. When my term concluded in 1994, I became a member of an environmental impact assessment committee under the Environmental Protection Administration and have participated in impact assessments ever since.

  During the last 15 years, I have seen just about every case that has arisen relating to the establishment of schools. In the beginning, I was happy to see new schools being built, hoping it would increase the overall population of people in higher education. But in recent years, because of considerations about the future population structure and the present capacity of universities, impact assessments on schools in more remote areas have often carried a warning, and a request to organizers that they reconsider. These warnings, however, have had little effect.

  I headed the impact assessment work done on A-ming's proposed university. Upon surveying the site, I discovered that, despite not being legally registered, a large amount of nursery stock had already been grown, to be transplanted during the construction of the school.

  I sensed, and could not help but admire, the founders' determination to establish their university. I therefore did not issue a warning. But now, after seeing media reports and seeing that A-ming is still having difficulty raising funds, I feel I really must add a note of caution.

  The day for this kind of thing has already passed. I truly don't have the heart to watch the shambles I foresee actually come to pass. But if A-ming wants to take his hard-earned money and do something meaningful for young people in the countryside, he will still be able to fulfill his wish to make a contribution there -- and earn our respect for doing so.

  Ouyang Chiao-fuei is a professor at the Graduate Institute of Environmental Engineering at National Central University.

  Translated by Scudder Smith

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