The Control Yuan on Saturday urged the Ministry of Education to do more to prevent the sexual abuse of student athletes after a report revealed 548 complaints alleging contraventions of the Gender Equity Education Act (性別平等教育法) in sports programs since 2014.
Control Yuan members Fan Sun-lu (范巽綠), Hsiao Tsu-yu (蕭自佑) and Jao Yung-ching (趙永清) said in a statement that the ministry must do more to combat abuse in athletics programs.
The Control Yuan reviewed records of complaints made to education authorities involving athletics classes and sports teams at primary and secondary schools.
Photo: Hsieh Chun-lin, Taipei Times
Students participating in athletics programs are at an increased risk of abuse due to the power imbalance inherent in the student-coach relationship, the Control Yuan members said in a report.
Baseball, basketball, judo, taekwondo, and track and field are some of the programs that had the most complaints in the nation’s education system, the report said.
Part-time coaches are poorly supervised, receive no standardized gender-equality training and their hiring is governed by an “interpretation of law” document instead of regulations, it said.
While the ministry has established regulations to govern the hiring of full-time coaches, its materials for gender-equality training is oversimplified and outdated, it added.
About 60 percent of K-12 students in special sports programs board at their schools, despite a ministry policy preference for elementary and junior-high schools to not provide living arrangements, it said.
As a result, school dormitories for athletics programs have no official staff and are essentially unregulated, making them potential hotbeds of abuse, it said.
The ministry should recognize that there are students in athletic programs that live at schools, and it therefore must create regulations to protect their safety, it added.
Such oversight is also necessary for temporary lodging for students when they are competing in sports events, it said.
Students in special sports programs or on teams often live and travel together, meaning that rules must be in place to prevent or address bullying from other students or abuse from coaches, the report said, adding that the ministry should review policies to police athletics in other countries.
Students in athletics programs should also be educated on body autonomy and gender equality, it said.
The ministry’s Sports Administration and K-12 Education Administration must improve interagency cooperation in protecting young athletes, it added.
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) today issued a sea warning for Typhoon Fung-wong effective from 5:30pm, while local governments canceled school and work for tomorrow. A land warning is expected to be issued tomorrow morning before it is expected to make landfall on Wednesday, the agency said. Taoyuan, and well as Yilan, Hualien and Penghu counties canceled work and school for tomorrow, as well as mountainous district of Taipei and New Taipei City. For updated information on closures, please visit the Directorate-General of Personnel Administration Web site. As of 5pm today, Fung-wong was about 490km south-southwest of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan's southernmost point.
Almost a quarter of volunteer soldiers who signed up from 2021 to last year have sought early discharge, the Legislative Yuan’s Budget Center said in a report. The report said that 12,884 of 52,674 people who volunteered in the period had sought an early exit from the military, returning NT$895.96 million (US$28.86 million) to the government. In 2021, there was a 105.34 percent rise in the volunteer recruitment rate, but the number has steadily declined since then, missing recruitment targets, the Chinese-language United Daily News said, citing the report. In 2021, only 521 volunteers dropped out of the military, the report said, citing
A magnitude 5.3 earthquake struck Kaohsiung at 1pm today, the Central Weather Administration said. The epicenter was in Jiasian District (甲仙), 72.1km north-northeast of Kaohsiung City Hall, at a depth of 7.8km, agency data showed. There were no immediate reports of damage. The earthquake's intensity, which gauges the actual effects of a temblor, was highest in Kaohsiung and Tainan, where it measured a 4 on Taiwan's seven-tier intensity scale. It also measured a 3 in parts of Chiayi City, as well as Pingtung, Yunlin and Hualien counties, data showed.
Nearly 5 million people have signed up to receive the government’s NT$10,000 (US$322) universal cash handout since registration opened on Wednesday last week, with deposits expected to begin tomorrow, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday. After a staggered sign-up last week — based on the final digit of the applicant’s national ID or Alien Resident Certificate number — online registration is open to all eligible Taiwanese nationals, foreign permanent residents and spouses of Taiwanese nationals. Banks are expected to start issuing deposits from 6pm today, the ministry said. Those who completed registration by yesterday are expected to receive their NT$10,000 tomorrow, National Treasury
RSS