Taiwanese students' ability to write in Chinese has deteriorated since the Ministry of Education eliminated composition as an element of entrance exams for senior high schools and universities, a Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) lawmaker said yesterday.
TSU Legislator Cheng Chen-lung (程振隆), one of the members of the Legislative Yuan's education committee, attributed the deterioration in writing skills both to the elimination of composition testing and to a reduction in the number of classes in written Chinese offered in elementary and high schools.
Cheng referred to an exam given to sophomores majoring in the Chinese language at Taipei Municipal Teacher College. According to Cheng, 94.2 percent of students failed the exam, which aimed to test students' basic ability in the Chinese language.
"Only six students out of 105 passed the exam. It is very worrisome that the students who failed the exam are our next generation of teachers," Cheng said.
Cheng also said that many words are written incorrectly in newspapers and on TV, which showed that the skills of professional writers had deteriorated as well.
Cheng urged the Ministry of Education to address the problem as quickly as possible.
Minister of Education Tu Cheng-sheng (杜正勝) agreed that a crisis exists, with more and more students unable to write correct Chinese and to express themselves well in writing.
"I think the problem stems from our exam system," Tu said.
"The cancelation of the composition test means that students don't have as much opportunity to develop their critical thinking skills and their ability to organize ideas. This is a big crisis in education," he said.
Tu vowed that the ministry will deal with the problem and will consider reinstating composition exams.
GREAT POWER COMPETITION: Beijing views its military cooperation with Russia as a means to push back against the joint power of the US and its allies, an expert said A recent Sino-Russian joint air patrol conducted over the waters off Alaska was designed to counter the US military in the Pacific and demonstrated improved interoperability between Beijing’s and Moscow’s forces, a national security expert said. National Defense University associate professor Chen Yu-chen (陳育正) made the comment in an article published on Wednesday on the Web site of the Journal of the Chinese Communist Studies Institute. China and Russia sent four strategic bombers to patrol the waters of the northern Pacific and Bering Strait near Alaska in late June, one month after the two nations sent a combined flotilla of four warships
THE TOUR: Pope Francis has gone on a 12-day visit to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore. He was also invited to Taiwan The government yesterday welcomed Pope Francis to the Asia-Pacific region and said it would continue extending an invitation for him to visit Taiwan. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs made the remarks as Pope Francis began a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific on Monday. He is to travel about 33,000km by air to visit Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore, and would arrive back in Rome on Friday next week. It would be the longest and most challenging trip of Francis’ 11-year papacy. The 87-year-old has had health issues over the past few years and now uses a wheelchair. The ministry said
‘LEADERS’: The report highlighted C.C. Wei’s management at TSMC, Lisa Su’s decisionmaking at AMD and the ‘rock star’ status of Nvidia’s Huang Time magazine on Thursday announced its list of the 100 most influential people in artificial intelligence (AI), which included Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家), Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) and AMD chair and CEO Lisa Su (蘇姿丰). The list is divided into four categories: Leaders, Innovators, Shapers and Thinkers. Wei and Huang were named in the Leaders category. Other notable figures in the Leaders category included Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Meta CEO and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. Su was listed in the Innovators category. Time highlighted Wei’s
EVERYONE’S ISSUE: Kim said that during a visit to Taiwan, she asked what would happen if China attacked, and was told that the global economy would shut down Taiwan is critical to the global economy, and its defense is a “here and now” issue, US Representative Young Kim said during a roundtable talk on Taiwan-US relations on Friday. Kim, who serves on the US House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Committee, held a roundtable talk titled “Global Ties, Local Impact: Why Taiwan Matters for California,” at Santiago Canyon College in Orange County, California. “Despite its small size and long distance from us, Taiwan’s cultural and economic importance is felt across our communities,” Kim said during her opening remarks. Stanford University researcher and lecturer Lanhee Chen (陳仁宜), lawyer Lin Ching-chi
RSS