The Control Yuan yesterday filed corrective measures against the Ministry of Education over what it said were controversies and ambiguities surrounding its “university systems” project.
Control Yuan members Chang Kuei-mei (仉桂美), Yin Tso-chien (尹祚芊) and Chang Jen-hsiang (章仁香) initiated the corrective action report, in which they criticized the ministry for shirking its responsibility to oversee the systems of the 10-year-old program by saying that it had not allocated budgets for the programs’ operations.
“The passive attitude adopted by the ministry has led to the implementation of disorganized policies in every fundamental aspect of the university system,” they said.
For example, although the ministry does not allocate budgets for the leagues, the report shows that part of the subsidies for the “Race to the Top Universities” project were issued for the leagues’ operations.
The funds are received by one school, which then transfers money to other members of its system, and this has created an opaque financial system, the report said.
Faculty and staff members, including principals, accountants and human resource managers, are active teachers appointed by members of the league, with some schools taking turns assigning officials, bypassing the nomination and voting process, the report said.
Despite not having any budgets, most leagues made plans to pay their staffs’ salaries, the report said.
Ministry Counselor Huang Wen-lin (黃雯琳) responded to the criticism by saying that the university systems are “virtual” institutions that operate independently from the tertiary institutes, therefore, the vetting process for league officials does not follow the process observed by universities.
She also said that only one system — which she declined to identify — had planned salaries for its staff, and that an investigation by the ministry found that none of the officials in question had claimed their salaries.
Part of the NT$500 million (US$15.2 million) budget for the top universities project was reserved for three systems — a NT$30 million grant issued to the Taiwan Comprehensive University System, NT$40 million to the University System of Taiwan and NT$50 million to a league comprising National Chengchi University, National Taiwan Normal University and National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Huang said, adding that the university systems project was a way for schools to pool resources.
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