The families of nine students from a Taichung junior-high school accused a female teacher at the school of three years of emotional and physical abuse.
Representatives of the students told a news conference yesterday that they were slapped by the teacher and that one of the students, who is from a single-parent home and has a learning disability, was given soiled underwear to embarrass her in front of the class.
The underwear incident stressed the student emotionally, causing her to be absent from school for an extended period, they said.
Photo: CNA
The students waited until after graduation to speak about the abuse out of fear that their studies would be affected, they said.
They called on the Taichung Education Bureau and the school’s administration to handle the issue promptly, “before other students are victimized.”
The school said that the teacher has been employed there for 15 years and while she was described as “strict” in evaluations, March was the first time it had received complaints about her from students.
After receiving a report in April from the father of the girl who alleged the underwear incident, the school launched an investigation, it said, adding that on Sunday it formed a task force over the matter.
A representative of one of the other nine students told the news conference that they had been yelled at and slapped by the teacher.
The mother of a student from a low-income family accused the teacher of exposing their family’s private affairs to other students, while other parents said that their children had been given soiled feminine hygiene products, or half-eaten or rotten food by the teacher, apparently to insult them.
The teacher refused to use the names of several students, referring to them only by their student numbers, said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taichung City Councilor Hsieh Chih-chung (謝志忠), who was at the news conference.
“There is clearly a big problem with this teacher’s emotional intelligence,” Hsieh said.
“If a teacher bullies an entire class, there is a major problem with their emotional control,” he said, adding that the teacher should not be allowed to continue in that profession.
DPP Taichung City Councilor Wang Li-jen (王立任) played a recording that he said was the teacher yelling at and insulting a student.
The yelling was so loud that students in other classrooms heard it, Wang said.
Wang also criticized tutors at the school, saying that a student had to seek help elsewhere after two years of a tutoring program at the school.
The tutors told the teacher that the student had sought their help, after which the teacher insulted the student on a routine basis until graduation, he said.
Wang called on the bureau to institute a better reporting mechanism at schools, as the current system is ineffective because teachers protect their peers.
EVA Airways today confirmed the death of a flight attendant on Saturday upon their return to Taiwan and said an internal investigation has been launched, as criticism mounted over a social media post accusing the airline of failing to offer sufficient employee protections. According to the post, the flight attendant complained of feeling sick on board a flight, but was unable to take sick leave or access medical care. The crew member allegedly did not receive assistance from the chief purser, who failed to heed their requests for medical attention or call an ambulance once the flight landed, the post said. As sick
A drunk woman was sexually assaulted inside a crowded concourse of Taipei Railway Station on Thursday last week before a foreign tourist notified police, leading to calls for better education on bystander intervention and review of security infrastructure. The man, surnamed Chiu (邱), was taken into custody on charges of sexual assault, taking advantage of the woman’s condition and public indecency. Police discovered that Chiu was a fugitive with prior convictions for vehicle theft. He has been taken into custody and is to complete his unserved six-month sentence, police said. On Thursday last week, Chiu was seen wearing a white
The Taichung District Court yesterday confirmed its final ruling that the marriage between teenage heir Lai (賴) and a man surnamed Hsia (夏) was legally invalid, preventing Hsia from inheriting Lai’s NT$500 million (US$16.37 million) estate. The court confirmed that Hsia chose not to appeal the civil judgement after the court handed down its ruling in June, making the decision final. In the June ruling, the court said that Lai, 18, and Hsia, 26, showed “no mutual admiration before the marriage” and that their interactions were “distant and unfamiliar.” The judge concluded that the couple lacked the “true intention of
EVA Airways, one of the leading international carriers in Taiwan, yesterday said that it was investigating reports that a cabin crew manager had ignored the condition of a sick flight attendant, who died on Saturday. The airline made the statement in response to a post circulating on social media that said that the flight attendant on an outbound flight was feeling sick and notified the cabin crew manager. Although the flight attendant grew increasingly ill on the return flight, the manager did not contact Medlink — a system that connects the aircraft to doctors on the ground for treatment advice during medical
RSS