The Ministry of the Interior’s acquisition of a property last week under the now-closed Chung Chou University of Science and Technology marked the first such transfer to the government for alternative uses.
The property, including 60,745m2 of land and 12 buildings, was valued at NT$2.36 billion (US$74.48 million) and transferred to the ministry on Tuesday last week.
The property is likely to be used by the reservist forces and the Quick Response Forces under the Second Special Police Corps, it said.
Photo: Taipei Times
Ministry of Education’s Department of Technological and Vocational Education Deputy Director-General Ko Chin-wei (柯今尉) on Friday said that the board of the foundation that owns the building, eponymous with the school, had been disbanded by ministry order and replaced with an interim board formed by faculty and experts on July 31 last year.
The ministry said it is planning to use the property to provide self-defense and self-help classes and training on other defense-related affairs.
The ministry said it would continue to work with the interim board of the school to handle its properties and other assets.
Photo: CNA
In other news, the Ministry of Education (MOE) on Friday said the nation’s declining birthrate continues to affect the education sector, citing 47 schools’ opting to have the ministry “reserve” 3,171 student recruitment slots for the next academic year.
The MOE said that junior colleges and universities have “reserved” more than 50,000 recruitment slots with the ministry over the past three years, but only 1 percent of that reserved amount, about 500, has been redeemed.
Reserved recruitment slots mean there is a gap between the number of students an institution is allowed to enroll and the number it could enroll, meaning fewer than expected students are admitted.
Starting from 2014, the MOE has allowed schools to keep a certain number of ministry-approved quotas for student recruitment “in reserve”; for instance, schools allowed to recruit 100 students but assessed that they could only recruit 60 can “reserve” 40 student recruitment slots for later use.
The MOE said that while the recruitment slots remain “reserved” with the ministry, universities nationwide are reporting decreased enrollment.
Public universities have reserved 163 slots this year, while private universities reserved 452 slots, and 31 science and technology universities reserved 2,756, the ministry’s latest statistics showed.
Public universities reserved 334 slots this year, they showed, but the number is expected to rise to 520 in the next academic year, marking a record high.
On the other hand, private universities saw 5,564 reserved slots this year, but the number is expected to drop to 2,851 next year, the ministry said.
Yangmingshan National Park authorities yesterday urged visitors to respect public spaces and obey the law after a couple was caught on a camera livestream having sex at the park’s Qingtiangang (擎天崗) earlier in the day. The Shilin Police Precinct in Taipei said it has identified a suspect and his vehicle registration number, and would summon him for questioning. The case would be handled in accordance with public indecency charges, it added. The couple entered the park at about 11pm on Thursday and began fooling around by 1am yesterday, the police said, adding that the two were unaware of the park’s all-day live
Fast food chain McDonald's is to raise prices by up to NT$5 on some products at its restaurants across Taiwan, starting on Wednesday next week, the company announced today. The prices of all extra value meals and sharing boxes are to increase by NT$5, while breakfast combos and creamy corn soup would go up by NT$3, the company said in a statement. The price of the main items of those meals, if ordered individually, would remain the same. Meanwhile, the price of a medium-sized lemon iced tea and hot cappuccino would rise by NT$3, extra dipping sauces for chicken nuggets would go up
Yangmingshan National Park’s Qingtiangang (擎天崗) nature area has gone viral after a park livestream camera observed a couple in the throes of intimate congress, which was broadcast live on YouTube, drawing large late-night crowds and sparking a backlash over noise, bright lights and disruption to wildlife habitat. The area’s livestream footage appeared to show a couple engaging in sexual activity on a picnic table in the park on Friday last week, with the uncensored footage streamed publicly online. The footage quickly spread across social media, prompting a tide of visitors to travel to the site to “check in” and recreate the
Minister of Digital Affairs Lin Yi-ching (林宜敬) yesterday cited regulatory issues and national security concerns as an expert said that Taiwan is among the few Asian regions without Starlink. Lin made the remarks on Facebook after funP Innovation Group chief executive officer Nathan Chiu (邱繼弘) on Friday said Taiwan and four other countries in Asia — China, North Korea, Afghanistan and Syria — have no access to Starlink. Starlink has become available in 166 countries worldwide, including Ukraine, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam, in the six years since it became commercial, he said. While China and North Korea block Starlink, Syria is not
RSS