Demonstrators took to the streets of Taipei yesterday against a new mechanism in senior-high school admittance, which they say is unfair because it does not take into account students’ grades.
The mechanism is part of the new 12-year national education system and deducts points from students each time they fail to be accepted by a school on their list, which effectively punishes children for aiming too high.
Hundreds of parents and teachers took part in the parade, organized by the Alliance on Obligatory Education.
Photo: CNA
They gathered on Ketagalan Boulevard, saying the mechanism is unfair because some students in the first phase failed to land a school, even though they obtained high grades in examinations.
“We have to save our own children, save our own future and our nation on our own,” they said.
“We want adaptive education and real democracy,” they chanted. “We want the point deduction mechanism abolished.”
The alliance said that the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators, having a majority of seats in the legislature, passed the Senior-High School Education Act (高級中等教育法) in June last year, and directly enforced the new 12-year national education system, without testing the system in advance.
This new senior-high school admittance process is like gambling, protesters said, adding that it deprives the parents of their right to choose the best education for their children.
“Why can the system not be made transparent so that students can choose the school they want according to their results?” one protester said.
“While the first phase of the admittance results have been announced, we want remedial measures in place for the second phase,” a parent said, while another parent shouted: “Minister of Education Chiang Wei-ling (蔣偉寧) step down from your post.”
A teacher surnamed Chang (張) said she was dissatisfied with the point deduction mechanism, which left six of her 10 highest-graded students without a school.
A parent surnamed Wang (王) said: “My son was shocked when he saw he was unable to land any schools, even though he scored 5 A’s and filled in 30 preferred schools.”
Another parent surnamed Lin (林) said there was no guidance for families to refer to when they filled in the school preference section, so it felt like gambling on their children’s future.
The protesters ended their demonstration at the Legislative Yuan, where they split into discussion groups for, what they called, “deliberative democracy on the streets” over two topics: whether point deduction should be enforced and how the entrance mechanisms should be redesigned.
The demonstrators also asked for grade intervals to be made smaller, as well as for the officials responsible for the flawed system to be punished.
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