A total of 152 schools — many of them private schools — still have rules on the length, style and color of students’ hair, or other regulations that “violate students’ rights,” the Humanistic Education Foundation said yesterday.
The foundation last month began an investigation into school rules nationwide, following up on reports from senior-high school students, and discovered 152 schools have rules that violate students’ rights, it said.
These schools have regulations regarding students’ hair, use corporal punishment, conduct illegal searches of dorms or students’ property, enforce compulsory extracurricular study, prohibit romantic relationships between students or have other regulations not permitted by the education system, it said.
Photo: CNA
Two of the most pervasive rules were the prohibition on student romances and prohibitions on hair styles and colors, it said.
Five schools carry out corporal punishment, which was banned in the education system in December 2006, it said.
About 90 percent of the schools have a mandatory eighth class per day for supplementary study, it said.
“There are even schools that require students to clean the school president’s home,” it said.
At some private schools, it found 11 regulations that violated students’ rights, were harmful to student development and in many cases also illegal, it said.
The Ministry of Education should increase inspections on schools and put an end to superfluous and illegal rules to protect students’ rights, it said.
The ministry should publish a list of school rules that are illegal, and implement an official channel for students to file complaints, Taiwan Youth Association for Democracy managing director Eddy Lin (林彥廷) said.
Such rules appear to be aimed at helping manage students’ study habits, but they actually impose excessive and harmful limits on students, Taoyuan Department of Social Welfare representative Huang Hsin-ju (黃欣如) said.
Students at private schools in particular said their feedback is ignored, she said.
Article 8 of the Educational Fundamental Act (教育基本法) stipulates that the nation must protect students’ rights to study, to physical autonomy, and to develop their personality, Kaohsiung Student Union founder Yeh Po-ting (葉柏廷) said.
Students should also be protected from corporal punishment and bullying, he said.
As students often lack the ability to speak up for themselves, education authorities must act on students’ behalf in the spirit of the law, he said.
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